Incomprehensible
by MrNoahall
Summary: 500 souls lost forever, by a machine the whole world had built together. And in the end, the very thing that united the nations is what tore them apart. When the dust was settled and civilization rebuilt, it was meant to be a fresh start. Unfortunately, ghosts of the past have a tendency to come back and haunt those who created them.
1. Creation

Incomprehensible

Chapter 1: Creation

I always liked to consider myself as abnormally lucky. Things just seemed to go my way when I most needed them to. I'd be rushing to school to print out an important essay before class and manage to have green lights the whole way to campus, or leave my wallet on the bus and not realize it for several hours, only to find it right where I sat that very morning with everything still inside. Of course, usually this meant that something would always go wrong afterwards in a very inconvenient way seemingly proportional to the original gain. I might make it to school early, but find that the first printer I go to doesn't have any toner and I'd have to find another one. Considering the negative seemed to be lesser than the positive, I still considered the situation as a whole lucky. Internally, I liked to describe this as having an eight out of ten luck stat. While I couldn't close my eyes, pick the answers of a test randomly, and come out with an A, I could at the very least guess correctly roughly sixty percent of the questions I didn't know. Not exactly A grade, but definitely better than average. It would be this very same luck that allowed me the opportunity to win the national raffle to decide who would be one of the first people in the US to use the Entanglement Network.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

At the tail end of the year 2017, tensions between nations were at heights equal to that of the Cold War during the sixties and seventies. The President of the United States was in an escalating war of words with the Dictator of North Korea, neither willing to back down. Europe was having terrorist attacks left and right, anything from bombings to U-Haul trucks driving through crowds of people. Russia was busy hacking different countries, fanning the flames of any civil unrest within them, further increasing tensions. And most of the Middle East as a whole was on fire due to almost two decades of civil war and insurrections. The world held its breath, waiting for the spark that would light the powder keg.

In hopes to prevent what would inevitably become World War III, the U.N decided that the world needed a common goal, something that everyone could work towards under the same banner, that would bring it together and prevent the spiral into oblivion. The goal that was decided upon after much deliberation would become known as the Entanglement Project.

At its core, the purpose of the Entanglement Project was revolutionizing the transportation industry through the use of Quantum Entanglement. Or in simple terms, near teleportation. Quantum Entanglement is a principal of molecular physics and quantum mechanics that when boiled down means two particles wrap around each other in a certain way to become Entangled. When it occurs, they can be moved away from one another and, regardless of distance, will send information between one another instantaneously. If one particle is vibrated up and down a hundred meters away, the other will vibrate in sync without delay. The theory was that if scientists could find a way to do that with objects like boxes or, if they dared to dream, people, it would unlock the door to instantaneous transportation, or as it's more commonly known, teleportation. The allure of being able to achieve that which people only dared dream about in science fiction movies proved too great for the nations of the world to ignore, especially when increasing public interest of the subject allowed politicians to tout their own support for it as grounds for reelection.

Progress at first was slow going, while nations may have been brought under the same banner for a common cause, working together on it was something else entirely. Differing rules and regulations on how things were meant to be done, political backstabbing over who would work on which area of the project, and disputes over all things funding were some of the major hurdles. It would eventually be decided that an impartial governing committee would be formed to handle all logistics of the Entanglement Project, from regulations to funding, answering only to the U.N as a whole. This smoothed the logistical side of the project enough to actually start making progress on the research and technical side. Unfortunately, one of the largest pitfalls with large-scale research projects such as this, people will still want instant results.

When no word was given on what progress, if any, was being made, public support began to wane. After roughly a year, polls showed that the average support for the project worldwide had fallen by nearly fifty percent. After another year, the project was down to having only eighteen percent of its original support groups. Something needed to change soon or else the Entanglement project would be shut down, and the funds moved to more immediately useful purposes. That something came from the first ever trial success.

On March 23, 2020, two years, one month, and seventeen days after preliminary research began, scientists had successfully entangled a particle of dust with a series of atoms and transported the dust particle two miles away by firing the atoms at near light-speed, and thus dragging the dust with it. Immediately Entanglement Fever took over the world once more. Funding increased, more scientists were dedicated to the cause, and public support of the project was renewed. In an effort to not lose out on the hype again, researchers began a monthly update newsletter, detailing progress made and problems solved. After another year and a half, they had another breakthrough, this time with a three-millimeter diameter pebble. Soon after they had moved up to a bottle cap. Then finally, after months of arguing and explanation, the researchers were given the green light to start using lab mice as test subjects, with the hope that eventually the process could be scaled up to fit humans.

The first clinical trial came with odd findings. Unlike previous tests, the mice took roughly three to five seconds to reach their destination points, and ending locations began to deviate from projections by as much as twenty-two meters. After debate and smoothing over media exaggeration, it was determined that the increase in travel time and decrease in accuracy was due to the increased mass. Thanks to a little principal known as relativity, when a mass travels at near the speed of light, time for the object slows down. The greater the mass the greater the slow down. Until that point, everything had been of minute mass, and therefore minute slowdown. But the mice had enough mass to make the slowdown of time noticeable. And when things are traveling at near light-speed, nanoseconds of difference mean wildly different positions, hence the decrease in accuracy. After several weeks of debate amongst the Regulations Committee, it was decided that the deviations from projections were acceptable, and that all further tests would be done with a margin of error taken into account. Thrilled that the research would continue, the scientists began work anew, each day becoming more accustomed to the slight deviations from expected outcomes.

It would be on June 17th, 2023 that a new record distance would be reached. The scientists had spent 2 months planning this test, one that would determine the viability of (what at that point was being called) Quantum Jumping between countries. They successfully managed to send the lab mouse all the way from London, to CERN in Meyrin, Switzerland. Over five hundred miles away from the starting location. The test proved that the technology was applicable for country to country transit. Construction began on designated points in participating countries to use for permanent sending and receiving. These would go on to be called Quantum Gates, and the system as a whole to be called the Entanglement Network.

Progress began increasing rapidly after that, and soon there was a Quantum Gate in almost every major city across the globe, ready to send and receive transported mice and eventually small packages. People became more and more sure that Human Transportation would work, despite there not being any tests with anything more massive than 30 grams. It would be after immense public pressure that the Regulatory Committee would give in and allow for the grand opening and first human use of the Entanglement Network. On March 30th, 2025, seven years and one week after the utterly massive and nearly indomitable project started, 500 Quantum Gates around the world would be turned on, and the first 500 people would be transported to destinations of their own choosing.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

As I stood there, in front of the great machine that would send me catapulting at nearly the speed of light away from Houston, Texas, and towards Edinburgh, Scotland, I thought about how utterly ridiculous this situation was. I'd only signed up for the raffle mostly because my friends wouldn't stop bugging me about it. I did have to concede their point at the very least. What's the worst that could happen if I enter? I lose and the money I spent on tickets gets spent by the government on new roads or something. So I bought a couple tickets, got them scanned into the national database keeping track of all the entries, and carried on with my life.

Went to work making 3D animation and CGI, walked the dog I had gotten after college like I had wanted to all my life, played more League of Legends than I probably should have, and hung out with my three best friends. I had some other acquaintances and people I liked at work, but Tristan, Richard, and Isaac were the only ones I ever hung out with in my free time. While not a social outcast, I always felt kind of awkward around people I didn't know out of fear that I would make a fool of myself. I had a tendency to restrain myself in social situations, trying to match my energy levels with that of the people around me, not wanting to stand out. Until things started getting excited that is. Once the energy of the room started increasing, then I'd start trying to be the center of attention and have a good time.

So naturally, standing there in front of the crush of people surrounding the Quantum Gate waiting for it to be used by a human for the first time, I was having the time of my life. My energy was so high, I was contemplating breaking into a dance routine right then and there. There was so much excitement in the air, and the noise was incredible, hundreds if not thousands of voices clashing together to form a cacophony of sound. The people closest to me, most of them with cameras and microphones, shouted questions at me to be heard over the noise.

"Where do you plan to go?!"

"What was your reaction to winning the raffle?!"

"Are you at all afraid that something could go wrong?!"

"What does it feel like…"

"Do you want to tell…"

"How are…"

More and more questions bombarded me as I stood in front of the Gate, waiting for the scientists to finish final preparations. The plan was to have all the gates activate at the same time, that way no one would appear without warning in the middle of another person's send off. The Gate itself was shaped like a big rib cage. There were a series of 3 arches that met a spine of sorts above me. Hanging from the spine on a set of rails was the chair I would sit in while my body became Entangled. When the wireless signal that would activate all the Gates reached this one, the atoms entangled with mine would be fired at nearly the speed of light towards the receiving Gate in Scotland. There was a screen next to the Gate entrance with red lights next to the names of cities all over the world. Fairly rapidly, the lights were starting to switch from red to green as more and more cities signaled they were ready to go.

One of the scientists ushered me away from the clamoring reporters and into the chair. It reminded me of a roller coaster seat with the way it hung down on the rails, and the harness came over me to keep me in place during the Entanglement process. Trying to figure out what it felt like to be Entangled was interesting, to say the least. As the chair moved slowly along the rails, it felt like my entire body was starting to tighten, like I was flexing every muscle at the same time, the skin could only just stretch far enough to keep everything covered. But it wasn't just my muscles and skin that felt clenched, it was my bones, my organs, even my hair somehow. The experience wasn't painful per say, just… tight was the best way to describe it.

Once the process was complete, I was let out of the chair and stood on a raised dais in view of the entire crowd. Part of me was pretty sure this wasn't necessary for the process to work and was more for the audience members. One of the scientists flipped a switch, turning a big red light on top of the machine into a green one. Immediately, the crowd erupted into cheers, knowing that the light signaled the Quantum Gate was ready to fire. After waiting for another minute, the scientist who flipped the switch spoke into a loudspeaker set up specifically for this event and addressed the crowd.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, it is my absolute honor here today to inform you that all four hundred ninety-nine other gates have given the green light, and we will be firing in sixty seconds!"

The crowd erupted into cheers, yells, and applause. It was so loud I actually took the effort of moving my stiff limbs to cover my ears. When the noise had died down, he continued.

"Before we send this young man off, I'd like to pass him the mike."

As he handed it to me he said,

"Be quick, you've got thirty seconds before the signal comes and you get sent off."

I nodded my understanding and addressed the throng of people.

"SO! Before I leave on the maiden voyage of what I shall dub the USS Millennium Falcon," There were gasps of horror at the sin I had just committed. "Yes, I did just cross the streams; I would like to just say a quick 'Thank You' to my friends who told me to sign up for the raffle," a grin split my face, "I bet you're absolutely kicking yourselves for it now! See ya in Scotland nerds! It's time for the countdown!"

The crowd immediately knew what I was getting at and joined in. This was Houston after all, the birthplace of the "T-minus Ten" countdown.

"T minus Ten!"

"Nine!"

"Eight!"

"Seven!"

"Six!"

"Five!"

"FOUR!"

"THREE!"

"TWO!"

I vanished before the "One!" had even formed in my mouth.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

When the signal was sent around the world, and the Quantum Gates were used for the first time on Human passengers, it was the most televised event in recorded history. More people had tuned in to watch it than the Apollo 11 rocket launch, World Cup, and Super Bowl combined. It was the beginning of a new chapter in Humanity's history. As the world waited with bated breath for the five hundred passengers to return, ten seconds passed, then twenty, and then a full minute. After two minutes had passed, crowds gathering around the Gates began to get restless, wondering why no one had shown up. Not a single Gate had reported someone showing up where they should have, or at all. After ten minutes had passed, it was clear to everyone that something had gone terribly wrong.

Everyone has different reactions to witnessing the unknown and unexplained. Some will react with curiosity, and try to understand it. Some will react with denial that it occurred at all, refusing to believe the thing outside their understanding existed. But most people will react with a mixture of fear and anger. Reacting with fear towards the unknown is something humans have done for centuries. It's what any living animal does as a quintessential survival instinct. And when that many people are gathered together, all feeling that fear and anger, things have a tendency to go south very quickly.

The fearful masses started to quickly grow restless without any forthcoming explanation of what happened. The situation was similarly mirrored around the world, crowds of people gathered together to see what some had been dubbing the eighth wonder of the world, all growing more fearful and restless with every passing second. It was only a matter of time until something set them off. In the case of Houston, that "something" was more of a "someone" shouting.

"So where did they go?!"

Like a starting gun, the crowd immediately started to react with similar shouted questions and accusations. The fear of the people built upon itself, each person feeding off the panic of those around them until eventually, someone reacted violently. No one knew who started it, but soon the shouting mass of people devolved into a full-blown riot. Pandemonium ran throughout the city as the rioters spread out and caused chaos to brew elsewhere. Some went up to the Quantum Gate where the scientists remained and began to attack them, blaming them for the disappearance of those who would later be memorialized as the Forever Five Hundred.

As Police, Riot Control, and even the National Guard were brought in to contain the panicking people, countries around the world were facing similar situations in their major cities. All with one major driving question. What. Had. Happened? The hours passed with still no explanation; and while most of the rioting had ended by nightfall in Houston, tensions remained high. In the coming days, governments would scramble to find answers. When none presented themselves, they did what came naturally and pushed the blame onto someone else. Fingers of national leaders were pointed at each other, accusations were thrown, and the world had suddenly found itself back where everything had started. Only this time, there would be no common cause to bring them back together.

The U.S blamed North Korea and Russia, who in turn each blamed the U.S back, with Russia also blaming China. The countries of the Middle East all blamed each other. In the end, it would be the assassination of a North Korean general that lit the fuse. Without knowledge of who was responsible, but suspecting the United States as the most likely perpetrator, they lashed out and sent a squadron of bombers to destroy the U.S military base on the island of Guam. Coming to the aid of their ally, South Korea retaliated and soon, once again, because of a complex web of allies and enemies, World War III had begun. China came to North Korea's aid. Russia saw the turmoil in Asia as the perfect opportunity to take back the Ukraine while the world had its attention elsewhere. The U.K would be who came to the Ukraine's aid, along with Germany. The fragile peace between Israel and its neighboring countries was quickly shattered, and the Middle East was once again thrown into chaos. Japan closed its borders, putting missile defense systems all along the coastline, and refused to get involved unless directly attacked.

With all the madness, escalating fighting, and rising fury, it was only a matter of time until the nukes were dropped. They rained down upon the world, wiping out entire cities, covering lands in ash, and reshaping the very land itself. The massive shockwaves sent tremors through the earth, reawakening long slumbering volcanoes and dormant fault lines. The increased fault activity created earthquakes, seaquakes, and consequently, tsunamis. Islands were sunk and washed away, California broke along the San Andreas fault line and drifted out to sea. Underwater volcano eruptions created new islands. The continents themselves began shifting, breaking, and moving. The face of the earth had been changed forever.

When the fighting finally ended, the remaining remnants of humanity started to rebuild and nature itself began to change. Radiation and hostile environments caused mutations, forced adaptation, and accelerated evolution. After all the continental drifting and shifting had finally died down, the continents had created a ring around the world, rising high into the sky and baked an angry red from the explosions and fallout. Numerous new islands had formed thanks to the undersea volcano eruptions and seaquakes. Many of the islands near the equator brought long-buried mineral deposits with their ascension, causing them to have their own magnetic fields. This had the effect of making the weather in between the islands erratic and unpredictable as the different fields interacted with one another as well as giving each island its own climate, irrespective of those near it.

No one could say what the future would bring, but all agreed that the remnants of the past could not be allowed to repeat itself. The twenty remaining vestiges of civilization came together and formed a unanimous agreement. To prevent the calamity that befell their world from repeating itself, all information of the previous century would be erased. Books were burned, paintings destroyed, cultures wiped out. No traces of the past would be allowed to remain in the world, their world. A world where history was rewritten to fit a preferred narrative.

There was just one small problem, scattered throughout the world were thirty blocks of stone, super-heated and condensed by the atomic blasts and made virtually indestructible. Inscribed on the blocks were pieces of very history the twenty kings wished to erase, including knowledge of the Atomic War. It was believed they were made by the Followers of U, a cult that formed during the fighting. All attempts to destroy or move the blocks failed, and after elimination of all known remaining members of the Followers, it was decided that all knowledge of the stones, and the language they were written in, would be banned. Breaking this law was punishable only by death.

After that matter done, the last remaining task before civilization could begin to rebuild was name the alliance of the twenty kings. After much deliberation and arguing, the name decided was **The World Government.**

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

 _AN: So, there you have it folks, the first chapter of what I hope to be a long-running story. I've been waffling back and forth for about two weeks on if I would actually write this, and eventually decided to just say screw it. The idea's been bouncing around in my head for a while and I just had to get it out on digital paper. My goal is for every chapter to be a minimum of three thousand words long. Preferably closer to four thousand. It would be awesome if I could do more, because who doesn't love more book, but it's not exactly likely to happen with my current school schedule. I am but one man. Anywho, Y'all know what to do. Review, follow, and be sure to never be the first one to use a Quantum Entanglement Gate. Or do, at least then you'd be able to escape World War III. Meh._


	2. Arrival

Incomprehensible

Chapter 2: Arrival

The first thing I realized when I landed was that my trip had been both slower, and faster than I initially expected. It was slower in the sense that I was expecting to not even have time to process moving, just one instant in Houston and be in Edenborough the next, like blinking. That was decidedly not the case. The moment the Quantum Gate activated everything blurred, doing that thing from Star Trek Wars where everything in sight elongates towards you. And then I was off, distinctly feeling movement but not having any frame of reference for how fast due to the blackness behind me and the whiteness in front of me. I discovered then that when you're traveling at basically the speed of light, you go blind, because I couldn't even see my hands when I thought they should be raised in front of my face. The trip was also faster than I expected because upon exiting what was to be forever known as Warp Factor Noah, I didn't slow down as much as I probably should have. In fact, were it not for the snow drift I barreled into, I was pretty sure that would've ended with me quite hurt. As it was, I got away from my little crash landing with only some disorientation and a face full of snow.

And that was when my brain started to process properly again. I quickly attempted to get myself vertical again, and fell back into the snow drift, getting ice and slush inside my shirt for my efforts. Thoroughly chilled and embarrassed at myself, I got back up, slowly this time, and observed my surroundings. I was only sure of a couple things, and none of them required much insight. First, I was decidedly not in Kansas anymore. Second, wherever the Hell I was, it was not Scotland. They may get snow there, but not the giant mounds taller than me at the end of March. It should have all been nothing more than puddles on the ground. Having filed away these two thoughts, I did the next logical thing. I panicked.

I ranted and raved to the heavens that had clearly forsaken me about how this made no sense! How had I gotten here?! The Quantum Gate testing had had variations in where the landing zone was, but never by possibly several thousand miles! I was going to die in a frozen wasteland all because I won a stupid… raffle… That brought me up short, my luck was what won me the raffle, which meant that as per usual something bad was supposed to happen shortly afterwards. Was this that negative outcome? That wouldn't make sense either! The positive had always outweighed the negative before, so unless winning the raffle was somehow a greater positive than dying in a desolate frozen wasteland, this wasn't my bipolar luck acting up. Or maybe my luck had simply run out. It didn't really matter honestly, either way I still had to find somewhere warm.

Thoroughly cooled down, in both the metaphorical and literal sense, my god it was cold, it was time to figure out Where in The World was Noah Sandiego? I patted myself down and found that I still had everything I left with, iPhone in my right pocket, wallet in my left, charger in my cargo pocket, headphones around my neck and Leatherman on my belt. I tried checking my phone, but it was so cold that the battery died before I could even enter my password. So that left me with process of elimination.

I asked myself, where are there giant snow drifts this late in the year? The first few places that came to mind were all very bad. And none of the ones that came after were much better. The first thing that came to mind was that I was somewhere in Antarctica, but the thought of that was so genuinely horrifying and hope-destroying, that I quickly banished it from my mind. My next thought was Everest, or somewhere close to it in Nepal. That was slightly less bad than Antarctica. In the sense that it's technically better to be shot in the face by a pistol than a shotgun. Again, I pushed that thought away and hoped to be in one of my third bad locations, somewhere in either Russia, northern Canada, or Alaska. The latter two weren't very likely all things considered because of the direction I had been aimed, but I wasn't going to rule them out just yet. At least people lived in those places, so I had a snowball's chance in Hell of living through this. Heh, talk about irony.

Knowing that I wasn't going to have any chance of living if I didn't get a move on, I stood up and picked a random direction to walk in. With nothing but snow visible in every direction, any direction was as good as any other. Hopefully, my showing up here was the extent of my bad luck, if my luck was even at fault for this, and my good luck could bail me out, because god knew I needed it. I walked as best I could in the snow, glad not for the first time in my life that I habitually wore hiking boots, and only wore my tennis shoes when I went to the YMCA. My green cotton cargo pants had really started to live up to the term "Death Cloth" just like my dad taught me. They soaked up water and snow so fast, it looked like I had been wading through a river rather than snow. Needless to say, my legs got immensely cold. To the point of it being a burning sensation. On the plus side, they started to go numb pretty soon after. On the downside, oh god my legs had started to go numb that was muy no buéno.

I looked around frantically, trying to find some form help, or civilization. Off to my right were some trees, pine it looked like, and to my left was… was that a castle? The cold really must have started to make me delirious because I had somehow not seen that silhouette of a castle roughly a mile out. Hard to tell given I don't know how big it actually was and snow really doesn't give much of a frame of reference. Maybe I was in Scotland after all? They were supposed to have a bunch of castles, though I'm pretty sure I would've heard if they were having record setting snow at the end of March. Either way, I immediately turned and began my death march toward the castle, hoping there would be someone living there. And that they wouldn't try to murder me on sight. I mentally added that last part after I realized that this situation was basically the beginning of every horror movie ever. Lost in the middle of nowhere, come upon strange house, strange house has actual Satan in human form living in it. Noah gets turned into a skin suit.

"What a fun series of thoughts Noah, real great job at keeping up that moral."

Self-deprecation aside, I kept walking and the castle started to get closer and closer. Conversely, my progress began to get slower and slower as the cold and exhaustion crept in. The wind was howling all around me, stripping away my body heat like a sandblaster stripping paint, while my jeans had long become completely saturated. Each step was accompanied by a crackling noise as I broke the ice that was forming on them. My body had long since stopped burning from the cold, instead became numb to the point that I occasionally looked down at the arms crossing my chest to make sure they were still there.

When I started thinking about how good a nap sounded, alarm bells started going off in my head. I knew that wanting to sleep was a good indication of severe hypothermia, meaning I was either there, or on the cusp, either way, a very bad sign. The shot of adrenaline that flooded my system from the fear gave me the boost I needed to push forward. I knew it wouldn't last long, the body could only produce and process so much, and the stuff was meant for short bursts anyway, like throwing the mountain lion about to maul you off of your chest or out running the crazy guy in clown makeup trying to stab you. Uhg, clowns. If for whatever sick, twisted reason there was a clown in the rapidly approaching castle, I didn't care if I died at that point, it was coming down with me. Did clowns even live in places like this? I felt pretty confident their natural hunting grounds were city centers, more potential victims and all that. So that was a plus, there at least wouldn't likely be a clown waiting to wear my skin at the top of the steps.

Wait… steps? I had been so lost in my thoughts about clown murder that my body had started to run on autopilot. It was only then that I realized I had reached the front steps. The incredibly large number of steps. Or was it only a couple? Things had started to go blurry, and I swayed as I stood there, barely able to keep upright. Good god, that was not going to be a fun climb. And my energy was almost gone. It was in that moment I realized how heavy my legs and arms felt. They were like dead weights, I didn't have any feeling in them but could feel their pull on the rest of my body. From what I remembered, that heaviness was caused by lack of blood in the extremities as the body tried to keep the organs warm. With painfully difficult steps, I plodded up the stairs towards the castle entrance. I was fairly certain the stairs were multiplying, because it felt like I wasn't making as much progress as I should have been. Midway up, I stumbled and fell. At that moment, the urge to just lay there and fall asleep was the dominating thought in my head. But I was just so close. I began to berate myself.

"If you were going to give up and fall asleep you should've done it when you got thrown into this godforsaken place. Come on! Tristan didn't spend two semesters being your trainer just for you to quit on your first real challenge! Get up, get up you weakling, and don't you dare fall asleep!"

I used the self-loathing as a means to create anger, and used the anger as motivation to start crawling up the stairs. I was going to prove myself wrong and make it to those doors. My pride would allow nothing less. The anger got my body to release the last dregs of adrenaline into my system, allowing me to haul myself up to the top landing. It took everything I had to stand up at the top of the stairs, but I did it anyway. I would stand proud over this land of ice and snow. For I had won. Looking back, I saw that I was only about five feet higher up than where I had started. But to me, in that moment, it felt like five miles. I don't think my brain was receiving as much oxygen as it probably should have, because in that moment, it seemed like a very good idea to cheer as I pulled the door further open. There was no coherence to the noise, just a pure sound of jubilation at having bested the snow. In the back of my mind, I also registered the fact that the door hadn't been closed. But I honestly couldn't be bothered to contemplate it as my minor celebration had used up the last vestige of strength I had left, and it was at that moment my knees gave out and I collapsed onto the floor.

"Hehehe, made it. Screw you tundra." I whispered out before finally submitting to the sweet embrace of unconsciousness.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

When the young man had stumbled in through the castle's front door, cheering like a madman, the blue nosed reindeer had been walking through the frozen foyer with the intent of heading to the library. His first reaction had been to change shape, from that of a typical reindeer, to a somewhat child-like appearance. Standing bipedal and three feet tall, he hid behind a nearby pedestal with a frozen vase of flowers on top. Unfortunately for the reindeer-child hybrid, he hid the wrong way, with half his face behind the pedestal and his body sticking out, leaving him completely visible. But the point proved mute when the young man, in clothes not at all proper for the island's climate, collapsed onto the frozen floor. As he laid there, he mumbled something that while audible to the reindeer, still sounded like complete gibberish. Then the man went still, and the reindeer got the confidence to take a closer look at him. What he saw, shocked him. While his upper body was covered by a blue rain jacket, he had icy patches on his shoulders and upper back. The man's hands were tinted blue and waxy, the majority of his face was beet red, with the tip of his nose also turning blue. It almost looked like the reindeer's own nose and would have been comical had he not known what those signs meant.

After the preliminary examination, which took roughly ten seconds, the reindeer did the first thing that came to mind. He panicked. Suddenly changing shape again, the reindeer took on a large, muscular, yeti type shape and picked the man up with both precision and ease, as if he weighed no more than a small dog. He called out further into the castle, moving further into the back rooms and away from the icy foyer.

"DOCTORINE! DOCTORINE!"

A door further down the hall slammed opened, and an old woman barreled past it with strength no one her age should be able to possess. She looked to be around seventy-five, maybe eighty years old, and yet she moved with the speed of someone a third her age.

"Chopper! What's wrong, has Wapol returned?!"

It was then she noticed the man the now named Chopper had in his arms.

"And where did you find him?! The idiot looks like he's been wandering around in the blizzard outside with nothing more than what he's wearing… that's exactly what happened isn't it. Walk and talk, we need to get this fool warmed up before there's permanent nerve damage, or we may need to amputate."

She took in the sight of his exposed hands and face, and knew that the kid still had a chance if he was lucky to get away from this. She'd seen worse, and the fact that the fingers hadn't started to blacken was a good sign.

"I was on my way to the library when I heard some kind of yelling coming from the front door. He stumbled in and collapsed on the floor, saying something I didn't understand before losing consciousness."

The Doctrine looked back at him skeptically.

"You mean to tell me that he just wandered in here, into our home on top of the tallest mountain on the island, while none of the cable cars leading here were in the towns? Are you sure you didn't disobey me and go into town on your own again, then find this kid passed out in the snow?"

She had an accusatory glint in her eye, promising retribution should it turn out he did just that. Chopper on the other hand was beginning to sweat vigorously, not wanting to earn the ire of his mentor.

"I swear! He just stumbled right on in! You know I wouldn't go into town to watch the hockey games on my own agai…"

He stopped abruptly in the middle of his denial speech, having realized the slip-up. Doctorine was looking at him darkly, fiddling with a scalpel that she hadn't been holding moments prior.

"Chopper…"

"I didn't go watch the Seals vs Bears game that ended five to three last Tuesday!"

He blanched. That denial had been as good as any confession. He continued speaking before Doctorine could begin her reprimanding.

"But he really did come in through the front door! It's the truth I swear!"

He was all but begging her to believe him at this point, and she knew he couldn't lie to her. The little reindeer was terrible at it. And considering they had a patient to deal with, Doctorine really couldn't deal with his past disobedience right now. If she sent him off to go clean the bathrooms or take inventory of all the medical supplies, she'd be left to deal with the kid by herself. She may be the best doctor on the entire island, but the task would still be made more difficult if only one person had to… Now there was an idea. She could finish two tasks for the price of one, and Doctorine loved a good deal. A witch-like grin spread across her face as she turned to face Chopper, just as they entered the castle's medical wing.

"Alright, I have decided. Your punishment for your disobedience will be to take care of this patient by yourself! You were his first responder, and therefore he is your responsibility. I will supervise your actions, and take note of anything that may need improving. Let this be both a test and a lesson for you."

She took a certain about of dark satisfaction at watching the look of horror cross her protégé's face. Though it was somewhat diminished when she didn't see him rise to the challenge, and instead seem close to panic. She decided to throw him a lifeline, and give him a little love-love to balance the tough-love.

"You do know I wouldn't tell you to do something if I genuinely believed you couldn't do it correct? Or do you truly think so little of your mentor?"

That got him to react the way she wanted. A look of resolve came over Chopper as he carried the young man to a nearby bed. He nodded back towards the Doctrine resolutely before getting to work.

The first and foremost thing that he needed right now was warmth. The reindeer yeti used his massive strength to push the bed with his patient closer to the nearby fireplace within the medical ward. After taking a moment to light the fire, and with the heavy lifting done, he shifted into his hybrid form. The next step was to examine how far the frostbite went up his limbs. He started by removing the odd neon green earmuffs the young man had on. They didn't look like they would keep him very warm, but neither did anything else he was wearing. Setting them off to one side, the reindeer went about removing the boots and socks. If his feet were too badly affected, there was a chance they would swell up inside the shoes get stuck in them, causing further harm.

These seemed to be the only articles of clothing even remotely close to proper for the climate. The boots were a brown leather, with odd symbols branded on the sides of each. The left boot had an arrow pointing forward while the right boot had a circle with four lines pointing out in each cardinal direction, for a total of 16 lines. He mused that it was perhaps meant to represent a compass. The socks were tan and brown in color, made of wool, which seemed to have helped keep his feet from being as badly frozen as the rest of him.

With his feet in no immediate danger, he left them to simply be warmed by the nearby fire and moved on to the jacket. It was a solid dark blue, with Velcro straps on the wrists and an elastic pull cord at the back of the hood, near the base of the neck. What little protection it offered had thankfully been enough to keep the shirt underneath from being soaked. He would still remove it to check anyway, but it was reassuring at the very least. The frostbite on his arms quickly revealed itself to be no further than his elbows, likely from a fall into the snow, while his upper arms, chest, and stomach were all relatively fine. He had what appeared to be a tattoo of an eagle in front of a red, white, and blue background. Some unknown script was written underneath it, but the doctor couldn't be bothered to figure out the meaning of it at the moment.

Now for what looked to be the worst of it. The reindeer doctor had waited to work on the pants after finding them to be almost completely frozen. He feared that they may have frozen to his skin, and hoped that if given the chance to thaw he would not have to cut them off. Unfortunately, when he found the belt itself had frozen together and wouldn't be thawing any time soon, he mentally signed the death warrant of the young man's green pants. These were quite possibly the worst part of his entire ensemble. They were a thick cotton and soaked up moisture like a sponge. And at the moment they were acting like giant ice baths for the man's legs. Grabbing a pair of scissors, he heated them in the fire for a couple seconds to make getting through the frozen fabric easier. Cutting along the outer right side, and repeating the process on the left side, he was able to turn the frozen shell into two easily removable halves.

When moving them closer to the fire to thaw, a black leather object fell out of the left side pocket. It seemed that Chopper had cut the pocket open by accident. Picking up the object, he found it to be a simple fold-over wallet. Opening it up he found a card in one of the sleeves with the young man's picture on it. Next to the picture were symbols the reindeer had never seen before. It appeared to be some form of writing, not at all similar to the common tongue used almost globally. Setting it off to the side next to the weird earmuffs, he addressed the Doctrine.

"Can you take a look at his wallet? There are things in it I can't even begin to understand."

Raising an eyebrow at the fact that Chopper couldn't understand something, she walked over and picked up the wallet. What she saw left the usually self-assured woman gaping like a fish out of water. One gained a lot of knowledge when they lived for over a century. It was why she was arguably one of the best doctors in the world.

And she had enough experience to know what the symbols of a Poneglyph looked like.

They covered the various cards in the wallet. One was colorful and had some kind of fruit logo on it. Another was black with white lettering, and a grid on the back. Roughly half of the twenty boxes had been filled in with the same two symbols over and over again. And to seal her suspicions, the card with the young man's picture on it had even more glyphs written on it. Turning away from the reindeer doctor, so has not to distract him with her look of shock, Doctorine knew that this man was no ordinary person.

There was only supposed to be one person in the world who knew what those symbols meant, and this man certainly wasn't her. Which begged several questions. Who was he? Where did he come from? And how had he managed to survive so long without the World Government knowing and executing him?

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

 _AN: Well, that's a wrap people. I had a bit of a tricky time trying to make sure the Doctrine and Chopper's personality's stayed canon. But overall, I'm pretty proud of this chapter. It breached the four-thousand-word mark and got the plot rolling. Hopefully, people will start to see what I'm going for with this story. It's going to be an interesting ride, I'll say that. But for now, all that's left is for me to remind everyone of the usual. Review, follow, and be sure to never, EVER, wear cotton in the snow. You have been warned._


	3. Revelations

Incomprehensible

Chapter 3: Revelations

When I woke up, the first thing I thought was how much I wanted to just go back to sleep. My pillows were fluffy and my blankets soft. I was warm and wanted nothing more than to curl up and burrow deeper into the depths of my subconscious. I was moments away from doing just that when the voice of a nearby person made it far enough into my brain to warrant a response. Said response being for me to bolt upright as I remembered the memories of the previous... day? Night? My head swam and my vision went black as the sudden change of position dropped the blood pressure in my head.

"How long was I out?"

Rubbing my eyes with one hand, and using the other one to keep me from flopping back on the bed, I blearily began to look around the room. It seemed to be largely made of a light blue, almost white, stone brick. There was a fireplace at the foot of the bed, though the fire within had long died down to embers. A window to my left showed the snow-covered Hellscape I had escaped from earlier, confirming to me that my ordeal really had happened.

As I continued looking around, I found what I assumed to be the original source of the voice that had woken me. It was an old woman, looking to be maybe sixty-five, to seventy years old, though she wore the clothes of someone a third her age. A short purple jacket with orange flames on the wrists and midriff, with matching pants. She had round sunglasses sitting on the top of a head of platinum blonde hair. She was oddly familiar. Like I had seen her somewhere, but couldn't remember from where. I pushed the thought from my mind, she probably just looked like one of my friend's grandma's or something.

She said something to me that sounded like a jumble of syllables and vowels. Thinking I hadn't heard correctly, I yawned and shook my head, trying to escape the last vestiges of sleep and jump start my tired brain.

I looked at her and asked, "What'd you say? I'm still trying to wake up, wasn't paying attention."

While normally, waking up in some stranger's house would be cause for concern, the situation was somewhat unique. I had shown up at this woman's doorstep and passed out. The fact that I wasn't locked in a basement or missing my skin yet gave her some credibility points in my eyes. Though the fact I was wearing a plain white t-shirt and pajama pants instead of what I was wearing when I got here did bring up some questions.

"And where are my clothes?"

She looked at me wearily and took a swig of what looked like wine from the bottle I hadn't noticed her holding. Once she spoke again, and it still sounded the same as before, dread filled my gut. I placed my face in my hands, trying to not think about how probably screwed I was.

At home, I had tried to learn 3 key phrases in as many languages as possible. Said phrases being, "My name is Noah." "Where is the bathroom?" and "Sorry, I don't speak [insert language here] well." I had them down in Spanish, Japanese, French, and Portuguese, but those last two were only because I had a friend from France and another from Brazil when I was a kid. My Spanish was slightly more advanced thanks to required high school and college credits, but disuse had caused me to forget a large portion of the conjugation and grammar.

The point was moot, as what she had said sounded closest to something akin to... Asian. I couldn't tell if it had been Chinese, Japanese, Korean, or something else. Based on the fact that I was currently in a snow-covered castle, my newest guess for "Where In the World is Noah Sandiego?" was Tibet. According to my, admittedly shaky, knowledge of the region, Tibet had mountains, monasteries, and was a contested part of China. That at least checked off the snow-covered mountains and language boxes of my checklist.

I decided it wouldn't hurt to try all my options anyways, and ran through my laundry ways to say "My name is Noah." Spanish and Portuguese didn't get anything more than a blank stare, while French got a snort of laughter. I was fairly certain she was laughing at my attempts to communicate because she offered no response more than that. Japanese though, that got some recognition. There was confusion mixed in as well, but a reaction nonetheless. She said something back to me that once again had no meaning to me, so I went to phrase two of my list. Telling her I didn't speak Japanese got basically the reaction I was expecting. A groan of displeasure and another swig of wine. Well, at least I knew that whatever she was at least close to Japanese if not a perfect match. Like how Spanish in Spain wasn't the same Spanish in Mexico.

My attention was brought back to the woman when she stood up and started walking to the door. I made a move to get up and leave the bed to follow her when she all but appeared in front of me. How a woman of her age was able to move so fast boggled the mind. The fact that a scalpel had appeared in the hand not holding wine made abort my previous movement.

"Scheisse!"

I flopped backward in surprise back onto the bed. She glared at me, daring me to move, before poking me in the chest with a bony finger and pointing at the bed. Apparently, I wasn't allowed to leave the bed for some reason. Whatever the case, I nodded my understanding, hoping she would get the message. She gave me one last hard look, before turning around and walking away.

As soon as she had closed the door I was up and out of that bed looking for my things.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

Doctorine had been watching over the boy while Chopper took some time to rest. He had spent roughly an hour working on him and making sure nothing was in any more serious danger before starting the task of slowly bringing the boy's temperature back to normal. The kid had gotten lucky, no permanent nerve damage or even lost digits. Though his legs would probably never have hair again if his frozen pants killed the follicles like she suspected. Her apprentice had worked diligently and efficiently, covering the kid's forearms in towels soaked in warm water and switching them out when they cooled off. Only once the boy had turned back to his normal skin tone, and then pink from the hot towels, did the Doctorine finally tell her protégé that his job was done and to get some rest. She would make sure nothing happened to the sleeping kid.

She still found it hard to fathom that another poneglyph speaker besides the "Devil Child" Nico Robin could exist. And the fact that the World Government didn't seem to know about him made it all the more astounding. And while he had the face of someone eighteen to twenty years old, she had enough experience to know he was about twenty-six or twenty-seven, depending on if he'd had his birthday this year. She wondered where he could have been hiding, or how he could have even survived as long as he did without learning or knowing how to speak the common language. What made it even stranger was his ease at being around her, as if he had no reason to distrust someone he had just met. He was an enigma wrapped in a mystery, one that would likely never get any answers if they didn't find a way to communicate.

Now though, was not the time for that. Now she was on her way to Chopper's room to alert him that the boy had woken up. She didn't need him walking in the medical ward thinking the boy was still asleep and having them both freak out. Rejection from the boy he had saved would only worsen the reindeer's already poor self-esteem. And as for the boy, if he got scared by Chopper there was a chance he would try to run before being properly discharged. No one left the care of Dr. Kureha until she damn well said they could. She would not have him injuring himself further.

Pushing the door to Chopper's room open, she called out to him.

"Hey, Chopper. The idiot kid's awake, and he can't talk like..."

Doctorine trailed off as she realized the only living being in the room was herself. It seemed that Chopper had wandered off somewhere. The Doctorine sighed. She had a feeling she knew where he was, though how she hadn't run into him on the way to his room was a mystery. Just one more to add to her growing list. Deciding to simply let things play out, she headed to the kitchen to find a new bottle of wine. If he wanted to be rejected by another human, that would be a lesson he had to learn the hard way.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

The moment that scary grandma left the room, the hunt for my stuff was on. Looking around I saw bookshelves all along the walls, and a door at the far end. A circular table with a couple chairs was off to my right and a desk on the far wall opposite the bed. The arched entrance to a side room was direct to the right of the desk. Then I looked at the fireplace and saw the crumpled ball of green fabric. Feeling pretty confident that those were my pants, I went to pick them up. Only to end up holding the back pockets. My pants had been cut vertically in two!

Grabbing for the other half, I searched through the pockets. I found my phone and charger thankfully, but my wallet was gone! Then I noticed the hole in the left pocket. Dread filled me, as thoughts of my wallet buried under ten feet of snow filled my mind. Then the thought occurred to me that I hadn't had a hole in that pocket when I got here. It had to have happened when the lady cut my pants in half! Mildly proud of my deduction skills, I began searching for my other possessions once more. I checked the desk, opening the drawers and shuffling the papers around, but that proved fruitless.

With nothing left but the side room, I headed in to look. What I found both confused and slightly scared me. There was an eclectic assortment of things, almost like a shed. I found some normal doctoring supplies like scalpels, bandages, forceps and the like. A couple wardrobes sat off to the right wall. Then there was some weirder stuff. A couple gladiuses, a wooden mallet, an honest to god boot knife with knuckle covering grips, and even a freaking circular saw blade. Then I saw the table with the straps at each end and really began to wonder if the earlier assumptions of my safety had been made prematurely.

I decided it would probably be prudent to hide some of the weirder things just to be on the safe side. I stuffed the saw blade behind one of the wardrobes, wrapped the gladiuses in a spare blanket and put the bundle back in the drawer it had been found in. I decided to nick the boot knife for myself. While no expert in knife fighting, or even a novice really, a knife still had more than enough utility oriented purposes to warrant keeping it. And besides, the blade on my Leatherman had been getting dull anyway, so win-win. Turning back around to the entrance, it was at that moment I noticed my visitor. Or, more importantly, recognized my visitor.

Doing what I default towards when in a situation I'm not sure how to react to, I made a snarky comment.

"Never thought I'd say this, but I really hoped that scary grandma lady drugged me while I was unconscious."

Standing in front of me, trying to hide behind the entrance the wrong way, was the one and only Tony Tony Chopper. He had the burgundy top hat, the shorts, the braced antler, and even the blue freaking nose! And if none of that was proof enough, he was even in his hybrid form that looked like a furry child.

We stood there for a while, just staring at each other. I had a look of mild dread, and he had one of mixed fear and curiosity. Deciding to see if it really was the drugs, I grabbed at a nearby roll of bandages and underhand tossed them towards the reindeer. The whole time they were in flight, I mentally chanted.

'Don't be real, don't be real, don'tbereal, Don'tBeReal, Please Don't BE REAL!'

The way he caught the roll, seemingly by instinct, was enough to confirm my fears. I collapsed onto the floor and began having a complete and total mind melting existential crisis.

'How is he here? How am I here?! Where even is here?! What the actual HELL is going on?! He's supposed to be a fictional character in an entirely separate world from my own!'

And with that thought, a few puzzle pieces clicked into place. I remembered where I had seen that woman before. She was Doctor Kureha, mentor and maternal figure to Chopper. And they lived in a castle, on a winter island, on a mountain, in the Grand Freaking Line. A castle where the once king Wapol would come back and attempt to retake his throne, only to be thwarted by the very reindeer I had thrown a roll of bandages at and the future King of the Pirates, Monkey D. Luffy. And to top it all off, they were all supposed to be fictional characters and places that existed only in the minds of avid fans, and the world's creator Oda himself.

I don't know when the tears had formed in my eyes, but when I tried to look at Chopper again, everything had gone blurry. My mind was quickly falling into a death spiral, and I needed something to keep me grounded in reality, even if it was the very thing, no, person, who started it in the first place.

Whimpering, I reached out towards him, desperate for help, any kind of help. He seemed frozen in place, likely out of fear of my reaction. I didn't know what else to do, my whole world was falling apart around me and I was all alone. I did the only thing I could think of. I said one of the few words I remembered from those few lessons I had received.

"please..."

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

It was such a simple word, but one that seemed to do the trick. Chopper stiffened slightly when the young man addressed him, but then the understanding crossed his face. He battled with himself, fighting his own fear of humans, and his own desire to help people. How was he supposed to help someone so clearly afraid of him? Yet at the same time, would someone so afraid ask for his help? These thoughts plagued his mind until a memory bubbled up to the surface of his mind.

A younger version of himself, waved the flag of the late Quack Doctor Hiriluk, calling out for Kureha to take him as an apprentice and teach him to become a doctor. He remembered calling out that he would become the doctor that could cure anything because he believed that there was nothing in the world that could not be cured.

Coming back to the present, Chopper looked at the suffering young man and knew that his decision had been made. He would never be able to be the doctor that could cure anything if he didn't help this man. Resolve coming over him, he began to reach out to the young man.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

Darkness was clawing at the corner of my vision as I hyperventilated violently. My thoughts were becoming more and more jumbled as I tried to rationalize what was going on. The hand I had outstretched to Chopper had fallen on the floor when he had not taken it and was wrapped around myself, trying to give me some minimal form of comfort. The darkness was closing in around me, and I faintly realized I had started to sob. It was all too much, too unbelievable. Yet the proof existed in the literal room I was lying in.

When I thought the darkness would consume me and was getting ready to give in, I felt warmth grasp one of my hands. Two small furry arms, with hoof-like hands, began prying it away from my torso. I heard the source of the hands whisper things to me, of what I didn't know. But the tone was soft and comforting, letting me know that I wasn't alone. I began to push myself up into a kneeling position, still sobbing uncontrollably.

I don't think he was prepared for when I leaped at him and wrapped him in a hug. I felt him stiffen and momentarily try to pull away in shock, but eventually, he nervously raised his arms to mirror my embrace. We stayed like that for several minutes as I simply let all the stress of the last day wash out of me. I felt him shake every so often too. Later I would realize that he had probably also used me at that moment to release some baggage. I had probably been the first person besides either of his mentors to ever give him kindness instead of violence.

When we finally released the embrace, I looked at him and, pushing away the thoughts that threatened a relapse, said the last phrase I had in my arsenal.

"Thank You."

I then proceeded to hug him again. He stiffened again at first but didn't try to pull away. When I let him go, I stood up and walked over to the bed. Chopper had oddly decided to keep holding my hand, likely as an affirmation that this had just occurred. I knew now that I wasn't in any immediate danger while in the care of Chopper and Kureha, and crawled back under the covers. I looked back a Chopper, told him "thank you" one more time, and began drifting off to sleep. Who knew having a complete mental breakdown could be so exhausting?

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

When the Doctorine had heard the initial cry of panic coming from the kid's room, she simply grimaced ruefully at knowing that Chopper had once more been rejected by someone he'd only been trying to help. When the cries hadn't subsided after several minutes and had turned to sobbing, that was when she began wondering what was going on. Walking back into the medical ward she followed the sound of crying. She had not been ready for the sight that was before her. She was so shocked, the bottle of wine in her hand fell and hit the floor with a bang. While it didn't break, the noise was able to be audible over the sound of sobbing. Yet neither seemed to have even heard it. Standing before her was the sight of both the boy and her protégé in an embrace, loudly sobbing. And while she wanted to tell the kid off for being out of bed, she knew that this was a different kind of healing that they both needed. Healing not of the body, but of the heart and soul. With a witch-like grin, she decided to let it slide just this once, picked up the wine and left the medical ward once more. She'd check back a little later, once the two of them had a chance to calm down.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

When I awoke from my nap, I was ready to begin processing my situation. I wasn't at all ready to accept it, but understanding it was at least a possibility. I decided to start at the beginning and go from there. So question one, how had I gotten here? The answer, I used the Quantum Gate with the intent to go to Scotland and instead ended up on top of a mountain in what was supposed to be a fictional world. Question two, why might that have happened? While I would probably never know the exact reason, but I could make some educated guesses. My physics minor was finally going to be of some use to me. Crazy as I might have sounded to any observers, I began talking my way through it. When dealing with complex situations like this, I found that speaking out loud helped to arrange my thoughts in a cohesive fashion. It forced me to slow down my runaway mind.

"Ok Noah, let's recap. What do you know about the Quantum Gates? You know they work by entangling your body with atoms and firing those atoms at near light speed, dragging you along with it. During the testing phase, scientists found that the larger the mass, the more of a delay in the object's landing as time slowed down around it. That makes sense, we already somewhat knew that with relativity and all that jazz."

I rubbed my eyes with the palms of my hands, not liking where this train of thought was going.

"And it was known that the lab mice had a delay time of about four seconds. Relativity is exponential, so my weight proportional to that of the mice, a difference of about my entire body weight considering mice weigh less than a pound, meant that I had a hundred and forty-five pounds of extra mass. And therefore, a hundred and forty-five pounds worth of exponential time dilation. Right, so convert that to metric units to make math easier, and it comes out to, oh, around sixty-seventy kilograms. Let's average to sixty-five to make it easy. Ok, so I have my mass, now for the hard part. Change in relative time equals the change in my time divided by the square root of one minus the mass and velocity squared. My personal change in time was, about ten seconds I'd say. And one minus sixty-five times the speed of light equals… something I can't math in my head. God, I wish I had a calculator. "

I flopped backward onto the bed again, rubbing my forehead to alleviate a headache I knew was going to come soon. Since the math was getting far too complex to do in my head, I'd have to simply go by what I knew of the original timeline. I didn't want to keep thinking this out but did it anyway.

"Considering I have no way of knowing when the World Government formed in relation to when I left and what I know about the current timeline, if it's even close to my source material, then I've arrived no more than a year before Luffy's going to get here. And, Considering there was no World Government when I left, it can be reasonably assumed that I've traveled at a minimum of eight hundred and change years into the future. Not exactly the most accurate of conclusions, but considering I'm working with nothing but conjecture and educated guesses, it's the best I got. Well, it's official. I am fifty shade of screwed right now."

I knew what the implications of my situation were. Everyone I had ever known was long dead, the average person living here would have been considered a professional athlete from when I was from, and to top it all off, I was sitting right in the path of where I knew a mad king would return to claim his throne. A king who could, and would, literally eat me for lunch if I pissed him off or got in his way. I began to giggle. Softly at first, and then rising in tempo to hysterically. I wasn't sure what else to do. All my tears for the week had been shed hours earlier, and this situation was simply too absurd to not react to. Feeling myself on the verge of another breakdown, I smacked myself across the face.

"Get ahold of yourself! Now is not the time for another existential crisis. Look at the facts. You are alive, you have a decent guess of where/when you are and what got you here, and you're in the care of the two best doctors on quite possibly the entire planet. With the exception of Law, because his Devil Fruit isn't even fair."

That made me pause for a moment. Would devil fruits even exist? I couldn't see how considering they should violate the laws of nature, the existence of a certain talking reindeer gave evidence towards the affirmative. I shook my head again to focus and get back to my original train of thought.

The situation could have been worse. I could have ended up swimming in the ocean, or some deserted island without a hope of rescue, or in the middle of a Marine base. Thinking about the Marines brought me up cold. They were a problem I hadn't even begun to address yet. And while I couldn't think of much reason for me personally to fear them at the moment, my gut told me that I should probably stay away from them anyways.

"Not the time Noah, they are a concern for later."

It was time to fall back on one of my hard-learned lessons from college. There's no point if stressing about things outside of your control. I pushed thoughts of homicidal governing bodies out of my mind so I could think about more immediate concerns. Specifically, my growling stomach. I didn't know how long it had been since my last meal, but considering I had fallen asleep twice and walked over a mile in the snow, it had to have been pretty close to twenty-four hours.

Getting up and out of the bed, I walked over to the door at the far end of the room. I didn't even bother with looking out the door when the blast of cold hit me and I slammed it back closed.

"Right... half the castle might as well be outside because of the front door being left open. Why did no one ever think to move the bird's nest from the top of the door?"

Turning around, I then noticed what I hadn't earlier. On the round table by the bed was a surgical tray with my headphones and, more importantly, my wallet. I quickly snatched up my missing belongings and put them in their rightful places; the headphones around my neck and the wallet in my left pocket. Feeling whole once again from finally having all my stuff back, I headed to the door at the opposite end of the room. Just as I reached for the doorknob though, it was opened directly into my face.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

The Doctorine had felt the impact when she opened the door. She looked down and saw the kid sitting on the floor and clutching his nose. She knew he wouldn't understand her, but reprimanded him anyways.

"This is why I told you to stay in bed! Now you've gone and hurt yourself even more and I have to spend more time treating you!"

The fact that Chopper had been the one treating him the whole time wasn't important. She pointed to the bed.

"Get back in there and rest, your body is still repairing the damage done to it from your excursion through the snow."

She watched him roll his eyes, clearly getting the message at what she wanted him to do, and stand back up again. She heard his stomach growl, and he crossed his arms over him, hugging his gut. He mimed eating something, clearly trying to say he was hungry. The Doctorine just began pushing him back towards his bed before responding.

"Yeah yeah, I get it, you're hungry. It makes sense considering how much you've exerted yourself over the last day. Which wouldn't have happened had you done what I said and stayed in bed!"

The last word was punctuated by her pushing the kid rather forcefully onto the bed. He retaliated by throwing the pillow into her face. Her eye twitched momentarily before she was in his face again, scalpel in hand, grinning evilly.

"I would highly suggest you don't do that again you brat."

He tried to put up a facade of defiance, but she could see the nervousness behind it. Message sufficiently sent, she pulled away and threw the pillow back at his face. It made a satisfying *fwumpf* sound on impact. She turned around and headed for the door. His little display at least signified that he was recovering well enough, slower than she would normally have expected, but that was easily attributed to lack of proper sustenance. She'd have Chopper bring him some food soon enough, but for now, he had to sit and learn his lesson to not disobey Doctor's Orders.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

 _AN: Well, I finally got this one done. And sooner than I expected too. My plan had been to finish this and get it posted on the weekend, but then I ended up pulling out my laptop to work on it last night. One thing led to another and suddenly it was two in the morning and I had roughly three thousand words written. I figured I'd finish off the chapter today after my Political Science test, and then I'd suddenly written almost another two thousand words. Fun times. But anyway, enough of my rambling, it's time I remind the readers to Follow, Review, and to always say "please" and "thank you." Manners go a long way to getting what you want._


	4. Catalyst

Incomprehensible

Chapter 4: Catalyst

I glared at the door the Doctorine had just left through. Just because I knew she was the official medical professional here didn't mean I had to enjoy being put in time out like a five-year-old caught stealing cookies. So what if she was stronger and smarter than I'd probably ever be while also being one hundred forty and quite possibly immortal? I was a grown ass man who could make his own decisions. As such, I decided to get up and do something if for no other reason than out of spite. And residual emotions from earlier that really needed an outlet. But mostly spite.

'I should probably see a counselor at some point, though I don't know where I'd find one or if they even exist. Though thinking about it, neither of us being able to understand a word we say would just make the effort pointless.'

I sat up on the bed and looked around. Yep, the room was still the same as before, no obvious form of entertainment to be had. Honestly, I'd probably be willing to just laze away like she wanted if I had some kind of music or book to read. Anything to keep my mind occupied so I didn't have to think about the situation I found myself in. That thought brought me up short. I did have music. On my phone was roughly 6 gigs of songs, with everything from the Guardians of the Galaxy Soundtracks to Eminem rap tracks. I even kept a Christmas album on permanent download just because I liked to play along on my cello.

None of this mattered at the moment though, because when I pulled out my phone, all that popped up was the flashing red battery symbol. I'd completely forgotten that my phone had died almost as soon as I got here because of the cold. I looked around the room for some a wall outlet, or place to plug in. As was to be expected in a stone castle on top of a mountain, one did not immediately present itself. When I looked over at the nearby desk though, I did see the lamp and, specifically, the lamp's cord going behind it.

Walking over to the desk, I slowly pushed it to the side. The last thing I needed was to knock something over and attract the attention of the Witch Doctor again. She'd probably decide to strap my ankles to the bed until I was fully recovered if she caught me up and about again. When I'd moved it sufficiently to the side, my face split into a grin. Right behind the desk was a one-plug outlet that the lamp was plugged into. Unplugging the cord caused my grin to promptly fall right off. Instead of rectangular slots like what my chargers fit, the holes were cylindrical in shape.

"Because why would anything ever be that easy Noah? You know how much the universe enjoys screwing with you. Though, thinking about it, I don't remember ever seeing outlets or household electronics in the original timeline. One more question to add to the list."

I shook my head to clear my wandering thoughts and got back to the task at hand.

"Assuming that this is a standard outlet shape, then I should probably just bend the tines of my charger to match it. They aren't really doing me any good as is so nothing lost if I end up breaking them."

I pulled out my Leatherman and slid the plier head out. I squeezed the copper tines, attempting to create a circular bend that could fit the holes. I didn't need a perfect fit, just enough to create a connection and complete the circuit inside.

"Of course I'm getting more use out of my physics minor than my art major, there's a reason art's categorized alongside, philosophy, and gender studies as an unemployable degree."

Once again shaking my head to clear thoughts of past life choices, I set about trying to plug in the mangled tines of my charger. The holes were too small to fit the bent tines, so I went about narrowing them again, squeezing down on the pliers with more exertion. When they were as small as I was going to get them, I tried again. This time they fit, if a bit wobbly, and only sparked and popped once when I plugged it in. I most certainly didn't jump at the small flash and sudden noise like a scared little mouse. I hoped that I didn't trip some kind of circuit breaker, otherwise this whole venture would have been pointless and the Doctorine would know that I had been up and about. I felt pretty confident that fact her orders had been implied rather than verbal didn't matter in the slightest to her. So, in the spirit of preventing the calamity that would befall me should that future occur, I decided to get a move on.

When I plugged the cord into my phone I was delighted to see the lightning bolt appear on the red battery symbol, showing that there was a charge running through it. Unfortunately, without some form of a voltmeter, I had no way to know how much juice was actually running through the connection and no way of knowing how long it would take before my phone was functional again. With nothing left better to do, I pulled up the chair that had been next to the desk, sat down, and begun to sing one of my favorite songs to myself. Given the current status of the world and my position in it, my choice seemed a bit fitting.

 _There's a port, on a western bay_

 _And it serves, a hundred ships a day_

 _Lonely sailors, pass the time away_

 _And talk about their homes_

 _And there's a girl, in this harbor town_

 _And she works, laying whiskey down_

 _They say Brandy, fetch another round_

 _She serves them whiskey and wine_

 _The sailors say Brandy, you're a fine girl_

 _What a good wife, you would be_

 _Yeah your eyes, could steal a sailor, from the sea_

I let the lyrics wrap around me, trying to stay as on key as possible. Though without the actual song playing, that was a bit more difficult than I liked to admit. Wasn't like it mattered though, I was more focused on the memories the lyrics brought up and trying to make peace with them. I remembered where the song played when I watched Guardians of the Galaxy 2 with my Dad. Of the many times, I listened to it on the drive to campus, excited for my art classes and dreading my political science classes. I remembered my friends and family as best I could and thought about what once was. The time my cousin Richard and I made a homemade bottle rocket and set it off, only for it to fall over and launch at us. We always laughed about the scar he got from it.

Thinking back, it's honestly pretty lucky I lived through my childhood with all the stupid crap we did. Crawling into recycling bins and pushing them down hills and into the street, jumping off the roof of his garage and into his 4'6" deep swimming pool, jousting with our bicycles, all stupid stuff that could have gone horribly wrong, but we did anyway because it was fun. I remembered getting warnings and lectures from our respective moms on just how dangerous some of our more stupid ideas were, like the homemade bottle rocket, but I didn't remember ever listening to them. I would say that I should've listened to them when we decided to climb a waterfall, but the scar I got on my head after falling off was worth it in retrospect. And besides, it wasn't like we were trying to get hurt. A few scrapes, bruises, and stitches every now and then was just the cost of having a good time.

My reminiscing was brought to an abrupt halt when I felt something, or specifically, a someone, tap me on the shoulder. I came back to reality with a jolt, trying to see who wanted my attention and fearing that it was the Doctorine again. It was only then that I noticed how blurry my vision had become from the tears that had started to form at some point during my trip down memory lane. Wiping them away I looked back to see Chopper standing there, a small tray with a sandwich and a cup of water on the table next to him. He looked at me with evident concern. I still had to fight back the urge to shy away from him. While the Doctorine was proof herself of where/when I was, she at least looked human and fairly normal. Chopper though was just so different, almost alien, compared to anything I had ever seen before and I began to understand why so many people thought he was some kind of monster at first glance. But I knew better, I knew who he was and what he was. And to top it off, he had been the one to save me from my mind melting existential crisis. With that thought fixed clearly in my mind, my irrational fear lessened. I saw that Chopper looked visibly nervous, likely trying to gauge what my reaction to him would be this time. Having a meltdown from simply looking at him probably hadn't been the best first impression I could have given.

I breathed out a sigh and tried my best to release the tension from my posture before waving at him with a small smirk. He jumped a little at my sudden movement but didn't retreat, so that was at least progress. Keeping my tone light and calm, I addressed him.

"Hey there, I would've figured you wouldn't want to be within sixty feet of me after what happened the last time we met."

His head tilted to one side in confusion; I hadn't been expecting anything more either. I hoped that I'd be able to convey with tone and actions my acceptance of his presence even if my words were useless. At least I could thank him for the food properly. While I cared about formalities as much as vultures care about what they eat, my parents had at the very least given me a healthy respect for proper manners. I pointed towards the food, then to myself with what I hoped to be a questioning expression. He seemed to process that for a moment before stiffly nodding his head affirmative.

"Thanks."

I then got up to move towards it, only to stop when he recoiled backward. Clearly, our little moment hadn't assuaged his fears of humans, or at least me, completely. But at least he hadn't tried to poorly hide yet so… progress. He then looked past me towards the desk for some reason. Looking behind me I saw that my phone had finally turned back on! I couldn't stop the cheer that escaped my lips at the sight of that little Apple logo. Food all but forgotten, I looked back to Chopper with a grin on my face and motioned for him to come over. If there was one way to get him used to my presence, it would be by distracting him with amazement, and my phone would definitely amaze him. Probably.

I picked up my phone and dialed in the passcode, bringing up the familiar home screen. I beckoned Chopper over once again, trying to coax him to my side. He began to make small, tentative steps towards me and I resisted the urge to try and hurry him up. This was something that would need patience, and attempting to force his curiosity to overcome his fear would only hinder my efforts. Patience would simply have to be my "virtue of the day".

While he stepped towards me, I began to imagine what his reaction would look like at seeing a piece of never before seen technology. He'd probably be comically amazed beyond belief, forgetting about the potential "danger" I was associated with in his mind. On the back of these musings came a stray thought.

'What if his reaction isn't one of amazement, but of fear?'

My phone was a complete unknown at this time, and fear of the unknown is something almost hardwired into the DNA of all living beings. I'd have to tell him what it was called and show him what it could do in bite-sized pieces. Probably start with music, something calm and instrumental.

'Though, the look on his face if I started blaring Ozzy Osbourne or something would be freaking priceless. No, bad Noah. Don't traumatize the skittish reindeer person.'

When he was finally close enough to look over my shoulder, I tilted the device in his direction so he could get a better look at it. With my free hand, I pointed to it and said "iPhone." He looked at me with confusion, so I repeated the process. When he mimicked my actions, I heard him try to repeat the word. It sounded about as bad as could be expected for his first English word, but I could tell he was trying. I nodded my head in affirmative and motioned for him to watch.

Tapping into the music screen, I scrolled down until I found the song I was looking for. If I wanted to keep him from being scared then it'd be best for him to hear one he was familiar with. With a deft tap, I selected "Brandy" and turned to look at his reaction. As soon as the familiar lyrics began to emanate from the speaker, he twitched, likely startled at the sudden noise, before visibly relaxing and looking forwards in fascination. And that was when he once again inadvertently creeped me the hell out.

The irises of his brown eyes began to glow, lightening to a bronze, almost golden color.

'Son of a… how the flip is that still a thing? The glowy eyes were just supposed to be a comedic visual effect and yet, here they are. Much more biologically reasonable sure, but still freaking glowing. How different are the rules of nature now?'

So absorbed in my thoughts of differing physiology, and slight envy, I failed to notice the song coming to a close. It was then that Chopper caught me scrutinizing him, causing him to shrink back slightly. I shook my and grinned sheepishly, trying to put him at ease.

"Sorry, I was just noticing the glowing eyes. Never seen anything like it before and… you still can't understand a word I say. Right, this is gonna make my life difficult I can tell."

Hoping to get my point across nonverbally, I first pointed at him, then my eyes, and tried to make an expanding or glowing gesture with my hands. By the look of sheer confusion on his face, I clearly had done a poor job. I sighed and tried to think of how to show him what I meant.

'Show him… that's it, the camera!'

Pulling up the camera app I switched it to selfie mode, hoping he'd be as intrigued by the camera as he was the music. Showing him the screen once more, I handed him my phone to look at himself. He seemed hesitant to take it at first, but my insistence won out. He then started to look at it with mild curiosity, but not the same eye glowing amazement that I was looking for. Hoping to show him what the camera feature did, I went to tap the picture button, only for him to shift his hold on the phone and squeeze the lock button. This had several effects all at once.

First, the camera started taking a series of rapid-fire pictures, with an accompanying clicking noise and flash of the screen. Second, Chopper became startled at the unexpected light and sound, going to his primary reaction at this point of trying to create distance between himself and the source of his fright. The action had two effects, him backing up right into me and my phone careening across the room, disconnecting from its cable.

I cringed when it landed, knowing intellectually that the phone case had protected it from worse before, but still worried about the safety of one of my last remaining possessions. I stepped around Chopper and went to pick up my phone, finding it still in good condition, just as expected. Once again thankful for having spent the extra money on a life-proof phone case, I checked the screen and couldn't help laughing a little. Frozen in time was the still image of Chopper's comically startled face just before he threw my phone across the room. I swiped left a few times to find a dozen more photos similar to the first, showing the progression of his reaction. Selecting the images, I put them in an album of their own and set it to change pictures every half second. Now having made a small stop motion video, I turned back to the now sullen looking reindeer.

'The poor guy probably thinks I'm mad at him now.'

Doing a quick whistle to get his attention, I plugged my phone back into its cable and showed him my little creation. Watching that face of his change from depressed to amazed made my day, especially when his eyes started to glow again.

'Ok, I really hope there's a way I can get my eyes to glow, cause that's freaking cool.'

Mentally putting 'glowing eyes' right next to 'tail' on the list of Things Noah Wishes His Body Had, I focused back to the task at hand of getting Chopper used to my presence.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

When Chopper had gone to his patient's room to bring food, he wasn't sure what to expect. After having helped the young man though what he could only assume was some kind of panic attack, the reindeer doctor feared for his patient's mental health. He had at first assumed the attack was brought on by seer fear of himself, his patient had probably thought he was a monster like everyone else. But then the young man had desperately asked for help while looking directly at him. Had he just been looking at the floor or anywhere else, Chopper would have assumed it was a general call for help from anyone but himself. But the plea had been addressed directly to him which threw into question everything he had assumed about the man's condition.

Now here he was twelve hours later, bringing the man his first meal in at least twenty-four hours, possibly about to cause him another panic attack. He hadn't been expecting to hear the sound of a voice through the door. While the sounds and words were utterly alien to the reindeer, the shifting of tone and pitch, coupled with a rhythmic structure signified that it could only possibly be singing. Slowly, he pushed open the door and walked inside, careful to keep the small tray of food from bumping into anything and attracting attention.

Now inside the room, Chopper saw that the young man was once again out of bed against the Doctorine's orders. He was leaning back in the chair by the desk, the odd rectangular object now connected to a cord and plugged into the wall socket that the desk lamp had occupied. He had no idea what the man was singing, but the sight of him doing something so relaxed was a stark contrast to the previous interaction he'd had.

Setting the tray of food down on the table in the middle of the room, Chopper simply stood for a minute, watching the man and unsure of how to act until he saw the small trail of tears on the man's cheek. Wanting to stop whatever was causing the man's distress, the reindeer doctor went over to get his patient's attention and tapped him on the shoulder.

What followed would only serve to make Chopper more curious about who the man was, and where he came from. Gone was the man who had a breakdown at the sight of the reindeer hybrid, and in his place was one who gave him smiles, and showed him that the rectangular device, or as he called it an "I Fone," was some kind of music box and camera combined. The shift was so drastic he began to wonder if it was all some kind of ploy, and was ready to face rejection when he accidentally threw the "I Fone" across the room. Yet it never happened, the man just laughed and showed him a moving picture of himself just before he threw the device away.

It was then that Chopper realized that whoever this man was different from all the other humans he had met and, he hardly dared to hope it, accepted him for who he was. It was in that moment that the part of Chopper that actively sought knowledge, the part that drove him to become the best doctor in the world, wanted to solve the puzzle that was this mystery man. He clearly had secrets and knew things Chopper did not. And if any of it was related to medicine then Chopper needed to know about it.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

I was just about to move on from the camera function and really blow him away with one of my gaming apps when I felt a nudge on my arm. Looking down, I saw him pat his chest with one of his hoof, hand, things, and say "Choppa."

That gave me pause for a second. Why was he telling me his name when I already knew it? I looked at him quizzically for a second until it hit me.

'Oh my god Noah you idiot, you may know who these people are, but they've never met you before. You shouldn't know any of their names until they're introduced.'

Thanking the fact that I hadn't made the blunder of calling him by his name before I should have known it, I pointed at him and repeated the word. When he nodded the affirmative, I figured he probably wanted to know my name too. Deciding to impress him, I used phrase number one of three.

"Hi, my name's Noah."

The shock on his face at seeing me speak his language was priceless, and I immediately started to laugh. This got the response of him saying loudly saying something with an indignant tone. Getting myself under control, I used phrase three.

"Sorry, I don't speak Japanese."

He tilted his head to one side and made a sound of confusion at that statement, but I waved it off, shaking my head in resignation. There wasn't any point. Trying to teach/learn a new language from nothing took anywhere from three to five years. And sure, Chopper could probably pick it up a bit faster given his intelligence but…

'Wait a damn minute. Chopper became a fully-fledged doctor over the course of six years. And not just any doctor, but one of the best in the world. Back home that took anywhere from twelve to sixteen years to accomplish while going to a university designed for teaching medicine. Chopper managed it under the tutelage of a single woman. If anyone could learn English in a reasonable amount of time, it'd be him. And possibly Nico Robin, but she isn't important right now.'

Glad for my key phrases once again, I figured I could probably get my point across by butchering what I wanted to say. Hopefully, my horrendous Engrish would be enough.

"Chopper, I don't speak Japanese. I speak English. You speak English?"

Trying to get the tonal shifts right, while speaking a combination of languages was not easy, and I had to try twice more before the lightbulb turned on in his head. Nodding the affirmative, he agreed to learn English under my tutelage. Or, at least I hoped that's what he agreed to. Otherwise, this would get awkward very quickly.

"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"

 _AN: Wow, so it's been a while. You could almost say I haven't updated since last year. Terrible New Year's jokes aside, I have an explanation as to why it took so long to get this one out. Simply put, College happened. After midterms, I had at least one test/essay/project due every week until finals. And when finals happened, I began contemplating the benefits of dolphin diving onto a highway. Then I just kinda lost interest in writing for a while. But thanks to winter break, I found the time and motivation to write this one out. Anyways, enough of my excuses. It's time for me to remind everyone to review, follow, and be kind to all living beings. With the exception of wasps, because they're pricks._


	5. Routine

Incomprehensible

Chapter 5: Routine

 _AN: A quick note before this chapter starts, in order to facilitate more dialogue between characters, I will be putting anything that someone says in the One Piece language in italics to signify that Noah can't understand it. This means I won't have to shift perspectives everytime I want to have characters talk._

I surveyed the battlefield for what was likely the hundredth time that day. My army spread out around me in a sprawling mass, lacking the structured coordination it had possessed at the start of the battle. And standing on the hill opposite to my own sat the King who thought his kingdom superior to my own. He stood there in gleaming black plate-mail, more fit for a knight than a King. In contrast, I wore a breastplate with matching gauntlets and greaves, all polished to reflect the light of the sun and shine with an almost holy light.

Spotting one of my knights in an opportune position, I commanded him forwards. Ever faithful, my knight charged towards the enemy line of footmen. They were not his target, however, as his horse leaped over the wall of soldiers and landing squarely on top of the enemy priest. The priest had been a thorn in my side throughout the battle, calling upon his god to strike down my own footmen in merciless fashion. With him now out of the picture from being trampled, I was about to set my sights elsewhere when my eyes widened. The priest had been a trap! The Black King had used the man as bait to lure my knight into the path of one of his berserkers, who charged forward and pulled him from his horse before cutting him down.

Not one to take the death of my men lying down, I sent one of my own priests from across the battlefield into position to next take the King himself. As predicted, the Black King's men were ever loyal, and one of the berserkers sacrificed himself, diving into the path of my vengeful priest. This gave my adversary time to reposition and escape the line of fire. Pushing my advantage and hoping to keep him on the defensive, I sent my own berserker towards his line of footmen, cleaving a hole in the wall of soldiers. Just as I hoped, he moved his one remaining priest into position to take my berserker. This left one of his knights completely unprotected, allowing one of my footmen to break his stalemate with an enemy soldier and attack his flank. Caught completely unaware, there was nothing the mounted warrior could do to defend himself before being pulled from his horse and quickly dispatched.

Soon after, there was a lull in the fighting, losses on both sides causing those remaining to be more cautious in their attacks. Once again surveying the field of war, it was clear I had a definite advantage. Both of my berserkers were in play, along with both priests, compared to his one apiece. Unfortunately, he had directed two of his foot soldiers near the end of the battlefield. Soon they would be able to rescue their captured queen, and that could tip the scales firmly in the Black King's favor. Both of our queens had been captured early in the battle, their prowess in battle rivaled by none other than each other. It took a berserker and a priest together to even come close to their power. As such, I began to match his tactics.

At this point, trying to prevent the rescue of the queen was impossible. None of my men were close enough. And both pairs of my priests and berserkers, with their ability to quickly traverse the field, were preoccupied. As such, the only way to keep the scales balanced in my favor was to rescue my own Queen.

As the footmen began to march forward, I began to pull my other soldiers away from their current positions. They would be given the task of protecting the footmen on their way to rescue the Queen. It was a foregone conclusion that they would rescue their queen first, but if I could minimize the time she went uncontested, the fewer casualties I would suffer.

My attention was drawn elsewhere when I saw the Black King's last berserker come tearing across the battlefield. I puzzled where he could be heading as none of my soldiers were in his path. I watched him stop one click north and five clicks east of me before standing in place and looking around. It seemed that in his frenzy he had lost sight of his purpose.

Dismissing him for now as just another bloodthirsty fighter on the battlefield, I returned my attention to commanding my footmen towards their queen. As expected, the Black Queen would be rescued first when the footman sacrificed himself to the Gatekeeper.

The Gatekeepers were very odd creatures. Any time a battle was fought, one would appear for each faction and collect the slain, bringing back the bodies to the slayer's side of the battleground. Seemingly made of a grey mist, their appearance would depend on the viewer. Some saw a man with the head of a jackal wielding a curved cane. To others, they appeared as grey-cloaked ferry-men. And some even described them to look like a skeletal woman with the antlers of an elk. Regardless of appearance, should a footman make it to the opposing side of the battlefield and confront the Gatekeeper, they could trade their life to bring back one of the slain. The only problem with doing so was the newly reanimated were brought back on the enemy side of the field, often without the protection of any nearby allies.

It was for this reason that I had both a knight and berserker guarding my footman across the field. It impeded progress, but in the long run would make sure my queen was not slain again immediately after being resurrected. But this tactic caused me one small problem. In my caution, I had left a gap in my flank, allowing the Black Queen to be resurrected without issue.

I watched as she stretched and loosened her joints, stiff from her time of lifelessness, before turning to look directly at me. Fear gripped my heart as I realized my mistake. I had been played. The Black King had known I would seek to protect my queen when she was revived and had positioned his men in a way that the only available soldiers I could send were from the side of the field his own queen would revive from. In essence, I had left a gaping hole in my defense that the Black Queen was more than willing to exploit.

Before she could charge towards me, one of my berserkers broke away from his position and blocked the path, daring her to approach his king. She paused momentarily, analyzing the new threat before waving a hand, commanding the berserker I had seen earlier forwards. Now there were two berserkers between the two of us, and I was still at the disadvantage. If I were to command my man to cut hers down, she would be able to retaliate uncontested. But if I did nothing, my man would still be cut down and the threats would still remain.

It was a lose-lose scenario, with no clear way out. But only one path eliminated a problem. Sending my berserker forward, he charged the enemy with reckless abandon. The sheer ferocity of his attack overwhelmed his opponent before he could form a proper defense, cutting him down.

Before the Gatekeeper had even claimed the fallen soldier, the Black Queen had dashed forward, skewering my berserker through the chest while he was too winded to respond. Flicking her blade clean, the Black Queen returned her attention to me. That piercing gaze told me what I already knew. There was no winning this fight.

A King's job was to protect his subjects and trying to delay the inevitable would only send more of them to an early grave. I was forced to accept the one simple truth of the situation. I had lost, the Black Queen had me in checkmate.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

I knocked over my King piece, showing my acceptance of the checkmate and signaling Chopper's victory over me. And while I wanted to believe it had been a hard-fought win, I internally knew that he'd probably been playing me like a fiddle from turn three. The smug grin on his muzzle only served to affirm my theory. He only grinned wider when I reached across the table and flicked his forehead, reveling in the feeling of my defeat. Begrudgingly, I had to admit I deserved the nonverbal taunting as I'd do the same thing in his position.

It had been about three months since my stint at the Drum Castle had begun, and a lot had happened during that time. While the day to day had been usually pretty hum-drum, pun intended, there had been several major events that occurred to shake up the daily grind.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

The day after Chopper and I made our agreement, he and Doctorine had ended up in a rather heated argument. The topic of debate being related to me. What about me I wasn't sure, but I definitely heard Chopper refer to my name several times.

" _It's time for him to go Chopper. The kid's done healing and doesn't have anything to pay for the treatment."_

" _His name is Noah. And he just so happens to not have any clothes that could withstand the cold if he leaves. Plus, you said it yourself, he doesn't have any money. If he goes out there he won't be able to survive."_

" _Then he can take some clothes the servants left behind. I'm sure there's something in his size. The kid's managed to live this long on his own, there's no reason he shouldn't be able to continue to do so."_

" _But how do you know that? When Noah showed up, it was half frozen and only barely conscious enough to open the front door. We don't even know how he got up here. What if someone brought him up here against his will and intentionally left him to freeze in those clothes he was wearing?"_

" _If that's the case then even more reason for the kid to get out, the last thing we need is for him to bring us unwanted trouble. We don't even know who he is or where he came from. Especially with that tattoo and the wallet full of unknown symbols."_

" _I don't need to know where he came from, I just know that he's my friend! He accepted me for who I am, even asking for my help during some kind of panic attack. No one's ever done that before…"_

Chopper lapsed into silence for a moment, looking sentimental. I could tell that whatever he said had an effect on Kureha, he features softened and her tone became quieter.

" _And you're so sure about that, you would potentially risk your own safety just to keep him around. Even if it somehow put you in danger?"_

Chopper was quiet for a moment, seemingly contemplating what his mentor had just said. After about a minute he looked back up to her eyes resolutely and responded.

" _Yes. Even then. Noah's my friend and he needs my help. Something happened to him that's causing him pain, if not physically than emotionally. And I need to help heal it however I can."_

Kureha smirked at that, seeming pleased by what her protege had said.

" _After all this time, you still believe in that old Quack's teachings about anything being curable. Somehow that doesn't surprise me. Alright, he can stay."_

Tears began to well up in Chopper's eyes as he looked towards his mentor, smiling widely. I didn't know what had him so emotional, but it was clear that he had managed to win the argument between him and his teacher.

Following his victory, the reindeer hybrid beckoned for me to follow him. Having nothing better to do I complied. He then proceeded to take me on a grand tour of his home. Over the course of the next couple hours, I learned several things. First, we were on top of a sixteen-thousand-foot-high plateau, meaning that the air was incredibly thin. Several times during the tour we'd had to stop for a minute to catch my breath. While no stranger to hiking at high altitudes thanks to my days in Boy Scouts, I hadn't had enough time to acclimate like normal. This realization explained why my recovery had taken so much longer than it should have. The low oxygen supply meant my body was running at about fifty percent efficiency.

The second thing I learned was the basic layout of the castle. We started from the western side, as that was where the medical ward resided and therefore being of most importance. Besides said medical ward, the western wing contained the lab that Chopper and Doctorine used to study and create medicine, and a large storage room, filled with enough medical supplies and raw materials to stock a small army.

We spent a few minutes in the lab having a bit of fun. It seemed that Chopper wanted to impress me with his chemistry knowledge in the same way I impressed him with my phone and was mixing chemicals with some explosive results. Literally. He took two vials of liquid, one clear and the other pale yellow, and mixed them together. Then he wrapped ten small piles of grey powder with some kind of paper, tying them all off with small strings. I began to wonder what his plan was before he soaked one of the little paper cones in the liquid, and threw it straight to the ground. It immediately created a small flash and a loud pop. It was then that I realized he'd made miniature firecrackers. My inner pyro began to come out, and I started to grin. Grabbing one of the poppers, I threw it down on the stone floor where, just like the first one, it flashed and popped. They were small but fun, and we quickly used up the rest of the micro-explosives. By the end though, we had had a few close calls with the poppers landing near delicate lab equipment, so it was probably for the best that they ran out. I did notice Chopper giving me an odd look as we left, as if he was examining my face, but I was riding too much of a high from playing with explosives to care.

After leaving the lab he directed me towards the main kitchen, which had a pantry large enough to be considered a miniature warehouse, directly adjacent to a walk-in meat freezer and the dining room. My tour guide had given me a puzzled look when he saw me inspecting the door to the meat freezer. Sitting at two and a half inches thick and made of aluminum, the insulated door had an industrial grade lock on it that I felt relatively certain would keep its contents safe from any would-be thieves/Luffies.

From there we headed to the main entry foyer, a large circular room with a spiral staircase wrapping around a large stone spire in the center and leading into the ceiling. Embedded in the wall, about every fifteen feet up, were metal walkways held up by a combination of Ionic and Corinthian stone columns. These gave access to a large number of wooden doors leading to the various rooms and wings of the castle. At the ground level were two sets of large double doors, one set embedded in the central rising pillar, and another in the side of the wall opposite the main entrance. Neither of these doors were accessible due to one set being locked and the other being completely frozen shut.

It was worth mentioning that the front door was left open due to a bird's nest that had been built on top of it. This had the effect of removing any protection the interior had from the outside elements, covering everything in the foyer with a thick layer of snow and frost. Having lived in Texas all my life, and not being in danger of freezing to death again, I paused the tour to actually enjoy the rarity for a few minutes. It was fun to just watch the flurries in the air, swirling and sweeping as if following some unknown choreography. Getting into a small snowball fight with my reindeer tour guide was also entertaining. The little guy had a surprisingly strong throwing arm. With the doors to the eastern wing all frozen shut, we were left with only the northern wing to explore, along with the various towers and spires.

Housed within the north wing was a vast number of bedrooms, all nearly identical in layout. These had likely been the servant's quarters back before the king had been evicted. Nearby was the library. It was easily the largest area of the castle that we'd explored, taking up two floors of space with various antechambers branching off from the main area. We'd spent a decent amount of time attempting to find some kind of translation dictionary to make basic conversation possible, but to no avail.

Following the time in the library, was the cellar. The contents of this cellar? Whiskey and wine. Barrels upon barrels of it along with the accompanying brewing gear. I'd never really had a taste for alcohol, but I'd learned how to make it with my Dad back in the early days of my college life. It'd be fun to do it again if I could remember how.

Following the alcohol cellar was the final area of the tour, the throne room. When we opened the overly large and opulent doors, we were greeted by the sight of a large rectangular hall leading to the golden throne. The high, vaulted ceiling only added to the sense of grandeur. However, a thick layer of dust had accumulated on all of the surfaces, signaling that the room hadn't been used for a very long time. Regardless, the golden chair had a red plush seat and backing, with cushy looking armrests. I just needed to sit down and see what being a king felt like.

The moment I took my seat, I could feel the regality of it all. The royal banners hanging from the walls, the chair being far more comfortable than it had any right to be, the raised dais the throne sat upon, allowing me to look down upon all those who came to speak with me, they all displayed the wealth and power a king had at his disposal. And there I was, claiming that spot. It felt good. Really good. I felt like I belonged in that spot; I deserved all the opulence so readily displayed. At that moment, I began to understand what it felt like to be King.

And I almost immediately got bored of it. Sure the chair was comfy, but sitting there waiting for something to happen was not at all my idea of a good way to spend the day. And kings did that all day, every day. It made me wonder if that was why so many of them went mad and turned evil. They were bored out of their skulls and would rather create issues so there would be something to do besides sitting around as everything went great in the kingdom. We left quickly after that, hopefully towards something more interesting than the throne room had been.

After the grand tour, we headed back to the library and began to work on figuring out a means of communication. It had only been a couple days since my stay at the castle began and I was already sick of playing charades. After searching around and raiding some of the adjacent storerooms for various office supplies like pens and paper, we got down to work. I figured that if Chopper was going to learn English, a notoriously difficult and nonsensical language, I'd need to create concrete reference material. Things that could be universally understood, and be used as stepping stones to build the knowledge of the language. For the first time since my arrival, my Art degree would pay off because what I needed, were pictures.

My methodology was to draw a picture of something easily recognizable like a table, or book, and write the English word for it underneath. I then verbalized the word to show how it was pronounced and had him repeat it back to me. It took a few attempts for him to get the some of the pronunciation to an understandable level, but that was to be expected. I figured that we'd stick to nouns at first because I had no idea how to accurately convey abstract ideas like adverbs or conjunctions using simple pictures. It was just one more problem for future Noah to solve. Present Noah already had enough to deal with.

As it was, we ended up spending the next several hours of the day repeating this process, trying to associate the images with the words. And while it would probably be easier to teach just speaking, and not reading as well, I didn't know how to separate the two without slowing down progress even more than it already was. Granted, he seemed to be picking up on the words rather quickly; and remembered the word for each card after only two examinations. But I still didn't dare to get my hopes up about this being an easy process. Only time would tell if this investment had the ability to bear any fruit.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

Over the next two weeks, I got into a bit of a daily routine. After waking up, in one of the servant's rooms that I'd claimed as my own, I would head down to the kitchen for some breakfast. Oddly enough, this would be the only meal I ate for the day. Something about this future food was far more sustaining than what I was used to and would leave me feeling full until the next day. And even then, I felt like I could go longer without eating. I was somewhat displeased by this, as the oddity of my eating habits gained the attention of the two doctors I was living with. They had tried at first to get me to eat more during the day but stopped after an incident in which I got sick from overeating. From then on, they knew that something about my biology wasn't quite right and seemed to be a bit more watchful around me. I started to feel like a patient with some unknown disease that these two were trying to unravel through observation. It was isolating. As if I wasn't a living guest, but a specimen of examination.

Regardless, after my meal, I would normally have a few hours to kill while Chopper and Kureha did, whatever it was they did in that lab of theirs. I'd attempted to shadow them while they worked one day, an activity I was surprised to find they allowed, but found that my mostly forgotten tenth-grade chemistry knowledge wasn't up to the task of understanding what they were doing. It was obvious that they were either creating or researching medicines, but lacking any more understanding than just vague observation left the experience rather underwhelming to say the least. Though I was pretty certain that the resident Witch Doctor found amusement from the way their activities made my head spin.

So, with socializing with my two housemates out of the question during the morning, I was left to my own devices for a number of hours every day. And seeing as my phone could only provide so much entertainment without the internet I was once so enamored with, I was forced to get creative in a very literal sense of the word. Meaning that I went back to my roots as an artist.

My digital art degree had forced me to take prerequisite painting, drawing, and 3D sculpting classes before I was even allowed close to a computer. At the time I'd felt they were three steps back from where I'd been at in highschool, using professional grade programs. But they did serve a purpose, allowing me to learn to work with my mistakes rather than just pressing command+z. They taught me that a good project evolves over time, and the best ideas are the ones you get when you're half way through and don't want to change course. And they taught me to paint and draw using physical tools instead of digital ones, but I liked to think of those lessons as more ancillary to the philosophical ones. Regardless, after raiding another storage room for the necessary pencils, pens, rulers, and a near limitless amount of paper, I began to spend several hours each morning working on whatever caught my fancy.

At first, it was still lifes of my surroundings that became my subjects. The intricate stone work and semi-medieval design of the castle made for some interesting shading and angles, but I never felt too invested in the projects. If anything, the more I tried to draw my surroundings, the less motivated I became. There wasn't any connection between me and my creation, no desire to make it perfect, I was just going through the motions to fill the time that I was alone. They all ended up feeling cold and lifeless, as if made by a robot rather than a human.

It didn't help that during those first few weeks, I began to feel more and more isolated due to the lack of any form of meaningful conversation between my hosts and I. I loved to talk, and especially to banter and argue with people, even if it was just a simple lighthearted rebuke when a manager asked me to do something. The language barrier was something that essentially cut out a major portion of what made me, me. And it didn't look like that barrier would be coming down any time soon, as progress with Chopper's english lessons was still in its early stages.

My time with the resident reindeer hybrid was usually the highlight of each day those first few weeks. Being able to be at least slightly social did a lot to lift my spirits after the depressing art sessions. After I got done with whatever project I was working on for the day, that would usually be when Chopper and I had our lessons. He picked up nouns easily, and as the days passed I eventually began to try adding adjectives to the nouns. We started with colors, being the easiest to understand and represent. Instead of a gray chair drawn in pencil, it would be a blue or red chair drawn in pen. As before with the nouns, he picked up the colors relatively quickly though with slightly more difficulty when I began to use different shades and tones of each color. From there unfortunately, progress began to slow. Partly because we began to get into more intricate words and tense conjugation, but mostly because my methodology of using pictures as frames of reference became less effective as we got into more abstract ideas like the difference between ran, run, and running.

Nevertheless, the childlike Doctor persisted in his studies and that pushed me to create new ways to show what each word meant. I began to get creative, using my phone to make videos of actions to represent verbs that didn't translate well to still images. Honestly, it felt really cringy recording myself running, jumping, and performing other activities, but the effectiveness of the videos over the pictures could not be denied. The rate at which chopper memorized each verb was only marginally slower than he had done with nouns, but that was to be expected when each verb had different tenses they could be used in unlike nouns. It was my hope to be able to get through pronouns and adjectives before the inevitable time bomb that was Luffy showed up at our doorstep.

There was one thought that nagged at the back of my head after the lessons were over. What would I do when the inevitable arrival of the Straw Hat captain occured? I had to assume that it was inevitable due to the fact that nothing I had seen so far indicated that the timeline I knew of was wrong. How or why Oda had somehow predicted the future didn't matter in my mind, I could think about it later. What mattered was that I was smack dab in the middle of a timeline that didn't originally contain me, which meant that any actions I made had the potential to drastically alter future events. Considering I was teaching Chopper a dead language that didn't exist until I showed up, there was no chance to keep the future the same as I knew it. But there was a chance to at least make it run parallel to what I knew.

The question was, did I even want it to? Every night before bed, I would think to myself,

'What's the point of going through all this effort to teach Chopper the English language if he's just going to leave in a few months?'

It wasn't like I'd be going with him if he did leave, that would just be asking to get killed.

'Not only is everyone on that ship exponentially faster, stronger, and more durable than me, but so is basically everyone else on the planet.'

And the enemies would only prove to get more deadly as time went on.

'No, getting on that ship would be practically begging for death.'

So if that was the case, why was I even bothering with the lessons? It was initially to bridge the gap between us so we could properly communicate, but that had been a spur of the moment decision. I hadn't thought about the next step, or the next step, or the step after that. I hadn't been thinking about the future. I never did.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

My routine lasted for the next several months, slowly evolving over time, and being shaken up several times. The first was when my art projects in the mornings had eventually switched from the soul sucking still lifes, to pictures of people, places, and things from my past. I searched through every photo I had, and found my favorite ones for all my friends and family, before spending hours putting pencil to paper and drawing them out individually. I had been ignoring my grief at the loss of my loved ones up until this point, focusing more on simply adjusting to my new life. But I couldn't run away anymore, and began to immortalize those that I cared about in the only way I knew how.

It wasn't just people that I drew, but pictures of the Texas flag, of the sea pancake that had become my logo in high school, and of course the Eagle Scout badge that I had spent ten years working towards. Anything and everything that I could think of, that I didn't want to ever forget about, I put onto paper. These pictures would be a reminder of everything important to me. Because if I forgot about them, they would be gone forever. And I couldn't let that happen.

Finally having an emotional connection to my work gave me the motivation that I had been lacking in the previous weeks. Now I wasn't just drawing for the sake of filling time, but for a purpose. I began to get more into detail, spending multiple days on a project until it was the best I could make it. At one point I became so absorbed in my work that Chopper had to come look for me to start our lessons. The look of awe on his face when he saw the completed works that I had hanging on my wall was priceless, especially when I pointed out the pictures of my Dad, my Cabin, and my Eagle Scout badge, naming each one as we went. I was surprised to see recognition in his eyes when he saw the picture of the badge, his gaze flicking to my chest where I had that same badge tattooed. I reasoned that he must have seen it when he saved me from the snow. I hoped I got to explain its significance before he left.

The second big shake up was when Kureha walked in on us in the middle of a lesson. For the most part, she had left me to my own devices while I was in the castle. It wasn't that we actively avoided each other, we just didn't have much reason for interaction. So it had been a bit of a surprise when she strolled into the library one day searching for something, only to drop the perpetual bottle of wine in her hands in shock when she looked to our direction and saw what we were doing. It probably didn't help that I had casually smirked and waved when I saw her.

Faster than a woman her age had any right to be, she beelined to our table and began picking up and examining the various study materials that I had created over the course of our lessons. Chopper and I just sat there confused, glancing at each other and wondering what the problem was. The more she looked over, the more the color drained from her face. It was at this point that I began to seriously worry.

'Kureha's supposed to be one of the most self confident charact- people. People. These aren't characters anymore Noah, you know that. She's supposed to be one of the most self-confident people at this point in the timeline. For her to be this concerned about my teaching notes... this does not bode well for the future of my survival.'

I was brought from my thoughts when she slammed the papers back on the table hard enough to shake the wooden furniture. She then barked at her apprentice.

" _Chopper! Do you have any idea what you're doing here?"_

" _Uh… learning to speak his language. Noah offered to teach me his language so we could communicate."_

" _How long has this been going on?!"_

" _Since about a day after he woke up. Why? What's wrong Doctorine?"_

Kureha's posture sagged at that question. She clearly didn't want to answer whatever her apprentice had asked. Her tone shifted from accusatory to resigned.

" _Remember when I told you how his being here could put you in danger?"_

A nod from the increasingly worried reindeer hybrid.

" _Well, I wasn't making up how much danger being around him could bring. The language that he's teaching you…"_

" _English."_

" _What?"_

" _English. Noah told me that the language is called English."_

" _Learning Eng-... Engu-... that language, is outlawed by the World Government, with the punishment for knowledge of it being death. If it became known that you knew even this small amount, you would be hunted down to the ends of the Earth. The fact that he seems to be a fluent native speaker of it means that he should be having to outrun the entirety of the Government's power. The only reason I can fathom that he hasn't been killed yet is because they somehow don't know he exists."_

That proclamation left Chopper speechless. He could only sit there at the table, mouth agape, as he processed what his mentor told him. The longer this went on, the more I began to worry that this whole teaching thing had been one gigantic mistake. Clearly, something about English had Kureha spooked, and that meant that I should be scared as well. But not knowing what the problem was left me more confused than anything else. Eventually though, the silence was broken by a sound that hurt me for than I expected it to.

"Why…?"

Chopper looked at me with hurt and confusion written clearly on his face. The betrayal in his voice with that one word question cut deep. I didn't know what was said between the two of them, but it had clearly shaken the trust that the two of us had built. I had screwed up somehow, horrendously, he wanted an explanation from me. But there wasn't a clear way to fix the problem without knowing what the problem was.

" _I don't understand. It doesn't make sense. Why would a language be illegal? And how can he be a native speaker if it's illegal? And why would he teach it to me if it was so dangerous? Noah's supposed to be my friend! None of this makes sense!"_

At this point Chopper had become close to tears, hooves clenched into fists and his whole body tense. He shook with each sniff, trying to hold back his reaction to the new information he had learned. I was sorely tempted to go over there and attempt to comfort him, but fear that doing so would only make the situation worse held me back. If I was the source of his distress like I believed, trying to offer reassurance would probably just end up pushing him further away. But god was it hard not to go over there and just hug him. These past weeks had carved out a small place in my heart for the little reindeer kid.

The atmosphere was getting more and more tense the longer Chopper's outburst went unacknowledged. I looked to Kureha, trying to get some hint as to what was going on, but was met only with a scrutinizing gaze. It seemed like we were all waiting to see what the other two would do. No one was willing to make the first move, but that didn't stop me from having an inner monologue.

'What is wrong with you Noah? Obviously, you've screwed up somehow. And that means you need to fix it! But I can't fix the problem if I don't know what it is! So what?! You can tell that Chopper feels betrayed. His trust in you has been damaged, and doing nothing is guaranteed to only make things worse. At least if you try there's a chance to make things better. But what if… No! Enough with the indecision! It's time to reach down, grab a pair, and do what you set out to do.'

I had to pause for a moment at that thought.

'Did I seriously just use my Dad's favorite motivational phrase? Jesus, I really am rattled if I'm quoting him.'

With newfound resolution, I pushed my chair away from the table and walked around to where Chopper sat. I could feel Kureha eyeballing me as this occurred, watching my every movement. Crouching down, I tried to get eye level with him so he wouldn't have to crane his neck to look at me.

"Chopper. I don't know what's wrong, but I'm pretty certain that my actions are the cause of it and for that, I'm sorry. I know you probably can't understand ninety percent of what I'm saying right now, but if there's one thing I need you to hear, it's this. You are my friend. And I would never intentionally do something to hurt my friends. Now, I'm going to hug you and we're going to fix whatever this problem may be."

And I proceeded to do just that. Enveloping him in a hug like he was a teddy bear. I could feel him shake in my arms and he sniffled, before he croaked out something I had been desperately hoping to hear.

"F-... Frie-... Friend?"

"Yes Chopper, friend."

It was then that Kureha finally decided to speak up again.

" _I don't know why he's teaching you this language, and I don't know why he knows it, or why he seems unknown to the World Government, but there is one thing I can say for certain. Based on what I've seen of this kid's interactions with you Chopper, Noah truly does seem to care about you."_

It took a moment before Chopper was ready to respond to that, but he eventually did.

" _Yeah, I think you're right."_

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

After the whole language fiasco, things settled back mostly into normality. I never figured out what the cause of it had been, but I had a few guesses and none of them boded well for me. Rather than dwelling on them though, I chose to simply keep doing what I'd been doing up to that point and lived day by day. No use in worrying over things that I couldn't control.

My relationship with Kureha had surprisingly improved following the events of that day. It was mostly just little things. She would grin at me when we walked by each other in the halls, and I would in turn give her an arrogant smirk. Or I might find the occasional breakfast already cooked for me in the mornings. Either way, things had settled down considerably, but had become much more comfortable overall.

One fun change that occured was that I began joining them on weekly supply runs into the various towns. Up until then, I had usually been left behind and just waited for them to return. So it was good to finally start getting out of the castle that I'd been cooped up in for over a month and a half at that point. Raiding one of the wardrobes for proper winter clothes also helped make the whole endeavor more enjoyable. Whenever we went down in the cable cars, I made a point of flipping off the tundra that had done its best to kill me just because I could. My two companions looked at me funny at first, but eventually just accepted it as a quirk of mine. It was probably for the best that they didn't know what the gesture meant.

Regardless, the ventures proved beneficial for everyone involved. I got to get out of the house, Chopper learned the terminology for any objects we hadn't covered yet, I was given weird looks by the villagers for speaking in tongues to a reindeer, and Kureha gained another servant to carry things.

Speaking of Chopper, I was finally able to see him transform during one of these trips. It had been weird to say the least. I'd gotten so used to seeing him in his hybrid state that I almost forgot he had two other forms he could change into at will. And seeing it with my own eyes was something else entirely. The way he just gained mass and fur, his antlers growing out more, and even his shorts and top hat reshaping to match. How any of that worked I didn't want to know. Someone could have said that it was a form of controlled super cancer and I would accept it as fact. Regardless of how his powers worked, the transformation served as a stark reminder that the laws of science I once believed were ironclad were more suggestions to the people of this time.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

I was brought out of my reminiscence when one of my own pawns hit me in the forehead. I'd been so zoned out that I forgot about the chess game we'd just finished. Returning my attention to the matter at hand, and specifically the reindeer with another pawn in his, I quirked an eyebrow at him. He answered my silent question by waving an arm over the chessboard and asking a one word question.

"Again?"

I shook my head no. One complete tactical beatdown was enough for me today. Neither of us had felt like doing English lessons when we got back from the supply run in Cocoa Weed today, it had been a bit of a stressful experience for everyone. While we were down there Kureha was beset by a father who practically begged her to look at his sick son. After she determined what was wrong with him, I had Chopper do his best to try and explain it to me. It turned out that the kid had a viral infection in his leg that, if left untreated, would require amputation. That rang alarm bells in my head, but for reasons I couldn't remember. I wasn't worried about the kid, with Kureha around he'd probably be walking by tomorrow, but something about the kid was important, I just couldn't for the life of me remember what it was.

The paranoia that I was forgetting something important plagued me the whole way back up the mountain. I'd tried to put my mind on other things with the chess game, but it was only a momentary reprieve. Now that the game was over and I'd gotten stuck in my own thoughts, there was little chance that that I'd be able to put my worry out of my mind.

"Noah feel good?"

I looked up at my reindeer friend with a small smile, happy that we'd finally gotten to the point that he was basically speaking like a two year old. While that may sound like an insult or a bad thing, I considered it leaps and bounds better than when we couldn't speak at all three months ago. I waved off his concerns, not wanting him to be worried about me because I was being paranoid.

"I'm fine Chopper, just thinking too much."

I stood up from the table with a stretch and beckoned for him to follow, shrugging on the dark blue winter coat that I'd acquired for the first trip down the mountain.

"Come on, let's go for a walk. I need to clear my head, and the cold air outside should do the trick."

Walking out the door of the kitchen where we had been playing our game, I began heading towards the Frozen Foyer to leave the castle. Chopper hurried to catch up, grabbing hold of my hand when he did. With how intelligent he was, I sometimes forgot that he really was still just a kid, and a rather sheltered one at that, having only eaten his Human Human Fruit eight years before I arrived.

We walked in silence for a while as we headed down the stairs of the metal walkway that lined the perimeter of the foyer. I still couldn't get the thought that I was missing something important out of my head, even with the cold air nipping at my face.

As we walked out the front doors of the castle, I looked over the snow covered landscape of the plateau/mountain. The animosity that I had held for it was diminished considerably now that I was able to walk out in it and be properly warm.

As I scanned the pristine white field from my vantage point on the steps, I noticed something that seemed out of place. About two hundred yards away was a spot of what looked like yellow or orange.

'Well, that's weird, pretty certain that can't be flowers, and no animals up here would be that color…'

I pointed out the anomaly to Chopper and he looked equally puzzled, not sure what to make of the yellow-orange blob. With nothing better to do, we started heading in that direction, intent on figuring out just what it was.

As we got closer, and were able to see more details of the blob, the warning bells that had been an annoyance in the back of my head became a full on category five tornado siren. It wasn't a blob that we were look at, but people. Three people to be exact. One was a tall blonde-haired man in a black coat, and was completely unconscious. The second was shorter than the first, and bundled up in a yellow and orange plaid coat, with a straw hat attached to their head. Trying to see any distinguishing features beyond that wasn't possible with how covered the person was. I could tell though that they were unconscious like the first one.

But the third. The third was downright horrifying to look at. His black hair was matted and frozen, his arms and legs exposed to the snow and completely grey. Frozen blood trailed from his hands and shoeless feet. But the worst part were his eyes. As he layed in the snow, seemingly unable to do more than shiver, his eyes looked towards us with pure, utter, desperation. How he was even still breathing, let alone awake was incredible. We rushed over to their side to get a closer look. I had just looked down towards Chopper to see what his reaction to the situation was, when the black haired man somehow found the strength to reach up and grab the hem of my coat.

" _P-p-p-pp-please. S-s-s-save my frr-r-r-riends!"_

Looking at the scene before me, I finally remembered why that boy in Cocoa Weed had been important. Saving his life came right before the arrival of the one, the only, Monkey D. Luffy. And there was really only one thing I could say in this situation.

"Scheisse."

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

 _AN: This chapter… this freaking chapter. It didn't want to be written. Five separate times I wrote about a thousand words before scrapping the whole thing and starting over. Eventually, I applied the tried and true method of just putting pen to paper and writing whatever popped into my head, regardless of absurdity. Two hours later I had written that section about the dramatized chess game. Unfortunately, even after that I still struggled to figure out how I wanted to get from point A to point B in a meaningful manner. And then of course term papers and finals started happening, which brought my daily energy levels from about a seven or eight, to maybe a two. Three on a good day. But enough of my complaining, it's time for me to shamelessly beg everyone to Review, Follow, and not get bogged down by initial desires. Any good idea will change over time, even if it's just a little._

 _AN Pt 2: This chapter and all previous chapters were proofread and edited by the wonderful Syrisna. Not only did she put up with my laziness and excuses for longer than I deserve, but helped motivate me to finish this and I'm very grateful._


	6. Rescue

Incomprehensible

Chapter 6: Rescue

Chopper and I wasted no time in bodily picking up the three dying people and hauling them back to the castle. I got to see the reindeer's "human" form for the first time when he went to grab at Luffy and the blonde haired man who had to be Sanji. Though calling it a human form was a bit generous. He grew to be over seven or eight feet tall, towering over my six-three frame, with a build that would make professional wrestlers jealous. The fact that his shoulders and back remained covered in fur also detracted from the "human" look. He appeared more like what I would attribute a sasquatch to look like.

'And once again, the clothes change to match. Seriously, where is all that extra mass coming from?'

I shook my head to clear it of the distracting thoughts. They were something I could ponder later. Instead, I refocused on the task at hand and picked up the unmoving bundle of cloth that contained the orange haired Nami. A task made more difficult when I realized that the only way to effectively carry her would be a fireman's carry. Her coat was simply too bulky for any other hold to not risk an accidental drop in the snow. It wasn't graceful, nor was it comfortable, but it did the job well enough.

We began to quickly head back towards the castle, trudging through the snow at a hurried pace but not so fast that we risked taking a fall. With how weakened these people were, there was a good chance that one bad landing would be all the excuse their bodies needed to completely shut down.

As we approached the castle entrance, my thoughts wandered to how I would proceed during the next several hours. I knew for a fact that within the next day, Luffy would somehow be back to near full strength, Nami would be given treatments for her infection, and Sanji would be given the world's fastest spinal surgery. And at some point during all of that, Wapol and his two misfit minions would show up, wreck the place, get Chopper to face his fears, and eventually be thoroughly trounced by Luffy and Co.

Except for the fact that Chopper wasn't the same reindeer as he was in the original timeline. Now he was semi-trilingual, was friends with someone that shouldn't exist, and knew that not every human was a bad person. Which made me question how affected he would be at Luffy's eventual declaration of friendship. Would he even want to go with them when he realized that I'd be staying? If he didn't go, the chance of the Straw Hat Pirates surviving their trip to Alabasta would be reduced considerably. And were they not to survive, I could only shudder at the implications of what would happen if they didn't make it through Skypiea, or Water Seven.

'That's the last thing this world needs, a man made of lightning with a god complex running around and the World Government finding the blueprints to one of the three ancient weapons. I have to find a way to push Chopper towards exploring the sea to achieve his dream of becoming the world's best doctor, even if it means saying goodbye to my only friend.'

My chest constricted at that last thought. I hated to admit it, but I selfishly didn't want to see him leave. It was hard not to get attached to him when I regularly took the role of a second teacher. Of course, calling him my student didn't feel appropriate; he was Kureha's student and adopted son before I even showed up. The fact that he was the only other living being on the planet that I could talk to also made getting attached pretty easy. But life was all about making tough decisions, and making the right choice often meant doing things you didn't want to do.

I had just finished with my depressing inner monologue when we reached the medical ward. Conveniently, Kureha was already in the process of restocking one of the many cabinets filled with medical supplies when we arrived. It was Chopper who got her attention first, speaking with a surprising lack of panic but urgent all the same.

" _Doctorine! We have three new patients in need of immediate treatment! One has a worse case of frostbite than Noah did when he showed up, his hands and feet are shredded. Another has what is likely an injury to the spine if my initial examination is accurate. And the girl Noah is carrying is unconscious. Her face is flushed and her breathing shallow. No obvious outward injuries, likely some form of illness."_

After an initial moment to process what her protégé had just told her, the good Doctor dropped what she was doing and got straight to work issuing orders. The bandages she'd been putting away falling from the open cabinet in the process.

" _Put the two males in the operating room. Noah..."_

I jerked my head up at being addressed by name. It was the first time she'd said my name that I could remember.

" _Put the girl in the bed by the window, she can be dealt with later after the other two are stable."_

I had no idea what she said, but the way she had violently pointed at the bed by the window gave a pretty clear indication as to what she wanted to be done. Chopper and I headed to our designated areas with haste, not daring to waste time questioning her orders. Gingerly, I set Nami down on the bed and began to get the winter coat off her. While I had no clue how to cure her infection, I did know that she had an immense fever. Even through the thick winter clothes she was wearing, I could feel the heat radiating outward. Leaving the coat on would only trap the heat and effectively roast her alive. I needed to try and cool her down as best I could, ironic given I'd just rescued her from the world's greatest natural freezer.

"Hey! I need some ice over here! Ice, now!"

I called out to the two in the adjacent operating room and heard Chopper reply.

"Kitchen!"

That was all the information I needed before I began a frantic search for an ice pack. I dashed out of the medical ward, not bothering to close the door on my way out, and headed towards the kitchen. I didn't know why I felt so rushed, logically I knew that even without my help everything would turn out fine. But being part of an actual medical emergency made it pretty easy to tell that logical part of my brain to go jump off a bridge. Especially when each passing second felt like one more nail hammered into the coffin of the girl I was trying to save.

Taking the stairs down three at a time, I made it to the lower floor containing the kitchen faster than I expected. I stumbled to a halt and took a moment to orient myself before the search could begin anew. Behind me were the stairs, to my left was the door leading to the frozen foyer, and to my right was the hallway leading to the kitchen. I turned to my right and sprinted forward, shoulder checking the door open and bursting into the kitchen.

"Oww… Not my smartest decision."

I rubbed my now sore shoulder gingerly. All the doors in this castle were solid wood and were easily an inch or two thick, meaning that they were far more resilient than I gave them credit for.

"Right, the freezer. Gotta get to the freezer."

Getting my mind back on track, I proceeded to the walk-in freezer at the very back of the kitchen. I was immensely glad that Kureha had shown me the combination to the lock on the freezer door several weeks earlier, as now I could get inside without issue. The freezer itself was brilliantly designed. Rather than using the standard cooling systems that took immense amounts of energy, a series of vents leading directly to the outside allowed the natural cold air to do all the work. And because the vents outside faced downwards, there was no chance of snow building up on the grates and blocking the air flow. Of course, that also meant I was effectively walking back outside wearing only my standard day clothes.

"Oh Christ on a cracker this is freaking cold! Gotta hurry before I start needing my own treatment."

Thankfully, my two housemates/landlords were habitual organizers. All the meats were in the center, either hanging on hooks or in sealed packages. Perishable produce was on the right side, again in sealed packaging to prevent freezer burn. On the left wall was what I desired. Shelves and shelves of medical supplies, most of which I had no understanding of, including a large number of ice packs. I had no idea how long one would last, nor how many I would need, so I used the tried and true method of going completely overboard.

Grabbing an empty box from one corner of the freezer, I proceeded to throw a dozen ice packs into it and left the freezer with my haul. In my rush, I chose not to bother putting the lock back on the door. I could get to it later when less pressing matters were at hand. As I hurried back up to the medical ward, my breathing began to get more labored as the running around and excitement started to catch up to me. I was forced to slow down as I ascended the steps, and wished that I'd kept up with my exercise routine after college. I had loved being able to run around, vaulting over benches and railings on campus like it was nothing, especially since raw strength had never been my strong suit. Being able to avoid crowds by climbing over walls and going where others couldn't had been a pretty nice bonus as well.

"I should… really… get back... into shape. The snow… would make an… excellent cushion… for when I screw up… and fall."

Restarting my free running routine would have to wait though. Right now, there were bigger issues to deal with. Namely, the orange haired girl who was shivering like a chihuahua while sweating like a sumo in a sauna. It appeared that in the few minutes I was gone, either Chopper or Kureha had managed to get her into the standard patient attire of light blue pajamas.

Acting quickly, I set down my box of ice packs next to the bed and removed one. I placed it on her forehead, grabbed another one, and placed it under her neck. They would hopefully be enough to bring the fever down to a manageable level while the two actual doctors in the vicinity took care of the two males on the brink of death in the other room. They weren't saying anything while they worked, and I wasn't planning on going into the operating room to look, so anything they accomplished would be unknown to me until they were finished.

It was at this point that I started to realize how little I could actually do to be helpful in this situation. The two males in the operating room were in too severe a condition for me to do anything other than get in the way, while the girl in front of me was sick with an infection I had no clue how to help. Symptoms like the fever I could treat, but unless the underlying cause was fixed then they would only come back worse than before.

I began to pace around the room, nervous energy preventing me from sitting down. My mind whirred with activity, and I unconsciously started to talk to myself in an attempt to get my jumbled thoughts in order.

"Gah, this is so aggravating! Here I am, one of the only people with the capacity to help this girl, only to be unable to do anything because I can't freaking talk to the two medical doctors in the other room. And even if I could talk to them, it's not like I could just say 'Oh hey guys! I just wanted you to know that this girl was bitten by a prehistoric tick and has a disease that should be all but extinct. I even happen to know that it's called Kestia.' Because then, of course, they'd ask me 'Well gee Noah, how'd you know that? You're not a doctor like we are.' And I'd have to reply 'Oh, it's because I'm a guy born over eight hundred years ago and just so happen to have watched a TV show detailing the life of a certain black haired man with a straw hat and his misfit crew of friends.' Because that totally wouldn't get me a one-way ticket to psychosis therapy."

I paused to take a breath, and rubbed my eyes with the palms of my hands to try and alleviate a growing headache.

"And again, I'm going to actively avoid thinking about how Oda somehow knew the future, now really isn't the time for that. Though considering that in his timeline I didn't exist, I feel pretty certain that multiverse theory can be moved into the "Fact" category. Meaning that he wasn't seeing THE future, but just one of near infinite possible futures. As for how that could even be physically possible, maybe it was some kind of uncontrolled Observation Haki. Or maybe he was from that original future and somehow came back in time and... Didn't I just say I wasn't going to think about this?!"

My pacing came to a halt in front of the raggedly breathing girl on the bed, and I started to nervously run my hand through my hair.

"I swear, if I don't have a stress-related aneurysm by the end of the day it'll be a miracle. I mean what can I even-?"

The start of another monologue was cut short when I heard the door to the operating room open up. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that Kureha was walking towards me. Though what really caught my attention was the fact that she had a rather large hypodermic needle in her hand.

While being in the presence of the two doctors for several months, I had of course seen them with needles before. But what made this situation different was the fact that this was the first time the needle was coming directly towards me. As such, there wasn't any hope for me reacting calmly to the situation. Especially with how much I had worked myself up in the moments prior.

My eyes widened, my chest clenched, and it was all I could do to remain standing. Even still, I had to grab on to the nearby bedframe with shaking limbs for support. I couldn't stop the quiet pleas for mercy that escaped my lips.

"No, no no no please God no…"

Upon seeing my sudden fear, the old doctor stopped on her path towards me and narrowed her eyes. She simply watched me for a few seconds, examining my reaction, before she looked towards the hypodermic needle in her hand. Then to me. Then to the needle again. It was at that point that the confusion that had contoured her face drained away. With an exasperated shake of her head, she mumbled something to herself.

" _How the Hell has the kid managed to be here this long, and we're only just now finding out he's afraid of needles? And what happened to give him such a fear in the first place?"_

Slowly, she placed the needle in her hand on the table next to her. With the implement of death safely disarmed, I was able to get my ragged breathing under control and loosen the white-knuckle grip I had on the bed frame behind me. Which meant that I was fully capable of bolting to the opposite side of the room and preparing myself for an escape into the interior of the castle should that be necessary.

Thankfully, it wasn't. Upon seeing me get as far away from the needle as possible, Kureha picked it back up and began walking to her original destination. Which, to my immense relief, was the girl I had been standing in front of and not my own person. I breathed a sigh of relief and had to chuckle darkly at myself, embarrassed at what had been a complete overreaction. Though a small voice in the back of my mind said that it was justified.

"Of course she doesn't want your blood you idiot, not when there's a girl with an unknown illness standing directly behind you."

My muttered self-deprecation was ended when I saw the doctor preparing to insert the needle. Despite being on the opposite side of the room, I still had to look away when she injected the needle and took a blood sample from her arm. How anyone could stand to be near those things, let alone use them, was beyond me.

Regardless of how I felt though, I did understand the importance of the blood sample as Kureha took it to the adjacent lab. Without it, the two Doctors would likely not be able to understand what was wrong with Nam- the girl, until it was too late.

I had to remind myself not to think or refer to her by name until she properly introduced herself. If I screwed up, questions I really didn't want to answer would start being asked and the interest/curiosity that my two hosts shared towards me would only grow.

'Then again… if I were to tell people about my past and where I came from, no one would believe me. A guy with knowledge of the future, sent from hundreds of years in the past, via a machine that didn't work as intended, from a civilization that was in some ways more advanced, and other ways less. Yeah, the number of people who would believe that story is probably in the single digits. I wonder how this new world can be advanced enough to have things like cyborgs and lasers, yet still be largely reliant on winds and sails for transport.'

Having calmed down from my minor panic, and finally accepting that I would have to just let the professionals work and wait for instructions, I took a moment to sit down and ponder this new idea. It wasn't like I had anything better to do, and a break from all the excitement sounded like a good idea.

'If I had to guess, it probably boils down to the way land is spread out now. With the majority of the world's landmass now being made of separate islands, some only being the size of a city, priorities in technological advancement would obviously be different from in my time. Cars don't exist because rarely are islands big enough to necessitate them, and phones/phone lines aren't a thing because the Den Den Mushi exist. Throw Devil Fruits into the mix and suddenly things like fossil fuels aren't even a concern when people can literally generate crap like lightning or fire at will. Then there's also the fact that with the World Government in control, technological research is far, far, more focused on the creation of weapons of war than new modes of transportation.'

I leaned back in my chair and began to rock back in forth, still wrapped up in my contemplation. I barely even registered when Kureha came back into the room and headed to the girl on the bed, needle in hand. Safe in the knowledge that the implement of death wasn't for me, I was able to ignore it with relative ease.

'Speaking of weapons of war... the Three Ancient Weapons are of immense power and originate from a lost civilization. If I don't miss my guess, there's a greater than zero chance that they originate from my time. One's supposedly a battleship capable of wiping out an entire island. That means it could easily be one of the railgun battles ships being made right before I left. From the test footage I saw, those things could tear through steel reinforced concrete buildings like tissue paper from over a hundred miles out. And I have no doubt that the public was kept unaware of its full power.'

Kureha finished injecting the girl with whatever was in the needle at this point and headed back into the operating room. She gave me a sideways glance as she walked by, though what it was supposed to convey I wasn't sure. With her, and the needle, gone I decided to get up from my chair and tend to the girl. I figured her ice packs would probably need replacing soon if not already.

'Then there's Poseidon, the weapon capable of harnessing and controlling sea monsters. I know at the moment the weapon and its power are safely at the bottom of the ocean in the hands of the merfolk royalty. Though how/when it was created is beyond me. And while it has the potential to literally give someone control of the world by controlling the monsters in the ocean, I still feel like it's the weakest of the three. While control of the ocean is a massive boon for whoever has it, most islands have been shown to be largely self-sustaining, so most people living their lives wouldn't be affected too much.'

While I switched out the now melted ice packs with fresh ones, I was gratified to find that she seemed to be radiating much less heat than before. It appeared that my efforts in keeping her brain from roasting had been a success. Now I just had to keep it that way until one of the two doctors in the vicinity could give her the necessary medicine, if that hadn't been what Kureha had done earlier.

'And then there's Uranus, the weapon supposedly capable of bringing the world to its knees. Kinda wish I'd kept up with the show now, instead of losing interest after the Totland arc ended. I never managed to learn what form the weapon took, or what if could do. Which means that it's time to jump straight into worst-case scenario territory and assume that it's some kind of nuke. Or even a cache of multiple nukes. That's the only thing I can really think of that could be considered a possible world ending weapon from "ancient civilization." Though I guess technically my time really is ancient to the people of this time, eight hundred plus years is a rather large chunk of time in human history. Especially when history's been rewritten to suit the World Government's needs.'

I had just finished placing the last ice pack onto my patient, and was about to head back to my chair when I heard a groan emanate from her lips.

'Is she seriously waking up that fast?! I knew that Kureha's medicine was good, but she just administered it about five minutes ago, at most! Then again… fast recovery may just be one more genetic advantage the people of this time have over me. And it probably won't be the last one I discover either...'

My worries were proven to be mostly unfounded though, as she simply rolled over and curled up in the bed. This, of course, dislodged the ice packs that I had placed on her feverish upper body. I rolled my eyes at the minor inconvenience, and once again began the task of putting the ice back where I could to keep her cool.

Only for her to roll over again the moment I was finished, undoing my work.

'Ok, annoying but still not an issue.'

It would turn out to be an issue as the series of events repeated itself several more times, my patience wearing more thin with each subsequent repetition.

"I swear to god, if this happens again I'm going to start slamming my head against a wall. It'd be more productive than this Sisyphean task at the very least."

Just as I was about to attempt my amateur nursing one last time, I was greeted with another low groan and the slow opening of the girl's eyes. Eyes that matched her bright orange hair in color.

'How about that… I wonder what genetic mutation occurred in the last millennia to make that a thing. I'll stick with my blue ones though. Well, time to call in the doctors, cause I certainly can't explain to her what's transpired in the last few hours.'

I walked over to the door leading into the room I believed my two compatriots to be within, and called out through the wood.

"Oi! Kureha, Chopper! Help please!"

Looking back towards the girl, I saw her now sitting up in the bed. Her head was facing me, but her eyes roamed the room, obviously examining me and the new surroundings she found herself in. It made sense, waking up to a guy shouting at a door in an unknown location would weird anyone out. I could empathize with her confusion quite well.

" _Where… am I? And who are you?"_

I didn't have to understand what she said to guess what the obvious questions were. The first thing someone asks when waking up in an unknown place with an unknown person is generally always the same. At least, it is when dealing with normal people.

I walked over to the center of the room, sat down, propped my feet up on the table, and leaned back in my chair. I was stalling for time, hoping one of the doctors would come in and take the attention away from me before I was forced to answer. But as the seconds dragged on, it seemed I would be forced to break the silence that had descended within the room.

"At the moment you're within the medical ward of Drum Castle, the home of two of the world's greatest doctors and an artist/physicist who's been teaching a dead language to a talking anthropomorphic reindeer for the last three-ish months. My name is Noah, the aforementioned artist/physicist/teacher, and I will be your host for the evening. Please, nod your head twice if you understood even one percent of what I just said."

The blank stare of utter incomprehension, and slightly agape mouth, told me everything I needed to know about the effectiveness of that method of communication. I sighed, and drummed my fingers on the table before trying again, this time in a much more simple fashion.

"Drum Castle."

I waved my arm around the room to indicate what I meant.

"Noah."

I patted myself on the chest.

She seemed to snap out of whatever daze she was in. Understanding dawned on her features before contorting into a mix of confusion and mild irritation.

" _Why couldn't you just say that earlier instead of spouting nonsense at me like some kind of crazy person?"_

This was a question I couldn't parse the meaning of via context clues, nor could I answer it even if I did figure it out. So I went to plan B.

" _Sorry, I don't speak Dendai."_

Over the course of my time at the castle, I had learned that the language was no longer called Japanese, even if the dialect was very similar. For some reason though, she didn't seem to appreciate my response, a look of incredulity plastering itself on her face.

" _That doesn't make any sense! You just spoke it to tell me that! You seriously expect me to believe that you don't know the language you just spoke after you've answered all of my questions so far?!"_

I was surprised to get such a strong reaction from her. It had to have been something I said, though what that could've been I couldn't fathom. Thankfully, I was saved from having to respond to the girl's outburst by the opening of the door I had called into earlier, and the arrival of Kureha.

" _The kid's telling the truth. He's been here for over three months, and during that time has only said three things, his name, asking where the bathrooms are, and that he can't speak our language. Why he knows those three phrases and nothing else is a mystery. Though it's not the only one…"_

The old doctor trailed off at the end, seemingly speaking more to herself than those around her. She snapped back to focus quickly enough, and continued to address her patient.

" _Regardless, his lack of speaking capabilities isn't important right now. The more immediate concern is your illness. You have what's known as the Kestia virus, an infection caused by the bite of a specific type of tick that is supposed to be all but extinct. It causes flu-like symptoms at first, fever, chills, fatigue, and nausea. But after twenty-four hours the infection will spread, causing temporary loss of consciousness, muscle cramps, and intense fever. Forty-eight to fifty-six hours later, all but the strongest victims will enter a comatose state and the body will begin to cut off nutrients to the extremities as it attempts to protect the vitals. And on the fifth day after infection, the patient will enter cardiac arrest and die. You got lucky and arrived here roughly six hours before the coma set in. If I didn't keep Kestia antibiotics on hand just in case the tick ever re-emerged, you and I wouldn't be talking right now."_

Shock at Kureha's words was evident on the girl's face, and I could only imagine the wonderful and pleasant things about her imminent demise that she must have heard. She pulled herself together enough to ask a question in an only slightly shaky voice.

" _But I'm fine now right? I don't feel all that sick anymore, like I have a mild cold. I even feel like I could get up and walk around-"_

The moment she had started moving to get up, I knew how this situation was going to turn out. Personal experience had left a rather deep impression on me, even if I had actively disobeyed at the time.

Just as I expected, the orange haired girl was halted in her attempt to leave by a rather disgruntled Witch Doctor, doing nothing more than putting a single bony finger to her forehead.

" _You may feel fine, but that's only due to the fact that my medicine is currently running through your system. The infection is still in your system and won't be completely gone for another three days. Until then, you're staying right here. No one leaves my care until they're either fully treated or they're dead. Now, enough trying to get out of bed!"_

She punctuated her final sentence with a shove to the girl's head, forcing her to flob backward into the bed. I had to stifle a chuckle at that, the deja vu of my own experience coming to the forefront of my mind. It felt good to finally be able to relax and reset to my normal state of being after all the excitement and panic.

" _Noah, make sure she doesn't leave her spot while I'm gone. I'm going to go check inventory."_

I stiffened slightly at being directly addressed, and paid close attention to her hand movements. She pointed to me, then to the girl, then to the bed. I had to take a moment to think before giving her any sort of response.

'She either wants me to get into bed with the girl, or to make sure she doesn't leave it. And I'm pretty certain the former option would end up with me being castrated so let's assume it's the latter.'

I gave a sarcastic salute from where I sat to my apparent commanding officer. She rolled her eyes at my blatant disregard for her authority, but was used to it enough after the several months I'd been around that it was all she did as she left. It helped that despite my distaste for orders, she knew that I'd still follow through with the commands I was given.

As such, I proceeded to move my chair in front of the only viable exit in the room. While one could use one of three different doors to get out of the medical ward, one led into the operating room while another led to the frozen foyer. That left only one door that lead into the main interior of the castle and therefore only one exit that truly needed guarding.

I could tell that my new ward was gauging my actions, probably trying to see if I could be persuaded to disobey my orders if I had to guess. But the cocky smirk I shot her as I leaned back in my chair against the door told her the futility of such actions. She visibly deflated at that, realizing that she wouldn't be escaping the medical ward any time soon. Resigned to her fate, for the time being, she curled up under her covers and seemed to decide a nap was the best course of action.

If I had to be honest, a nap sounded like a good idea to me too. I'd just keep watch for a few more minutes to make sure she actually went to sleep and then rest my eyes for a bit. It wasn't like she could go anywhere with me blocking the only real exit after all.

 **"_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_"**

 _AN: Holy christ this was close. I promised myself to write one chapter a month minimum over the summer and almost missed my deadline for June. To be honest, I had about two-thirds of the chapter done about two weeks after chapter five was posted. But then the ranch I'm working at this summer caught fire and it's basically been pure chaos since then. But hey, I still got it done and managed to meet my self-appointed deadline. Now to just hope that July is more relaxed than June has been. Regardless, I would just like all of you wonderful readers to Review, Follow, and learn some basic first aid skills. You never know when they might come in handy._

 _AN pt. 2: This chapter was proofread and edited by the wonderful Syrisna. She's continued to be a big help with making this story better than I could make it on my own. Check out her stories if you want; I personally quite like ReunionS, a story about what Sabo was up to when he regained his memories after the War of the Best._


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